


Completely Booked

by lettered



Series: Wild and Wired [5]
Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: M/M, calendars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-07-07 17:07:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19855864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lettered/pseuds/lettered
Summary: Patrick has a calendar. He puts David on it.They keep their appointments.Then they do more scheduling.





	Completely Booked

**Author's Note:**

> This comes directly after the last fic in the series, but you don't have to have read that to get this. It's fairly straight forward.
> 
> Thank you to codswallop for being so thoughtful with me about pacing, for listening, and for reading. Thank you to all of the folks who listened to me complain about the length of this sex scene, and for being rad.
> 
> *

The story of how Wednesday became Scheduled Sex Night went like this.

*

Mondays were Patrick’s Sunday, the second day of his weekend, which meant that David had to wake up early to open the store alone. Once he had rushed to get the lights on and sign flipped and cash in the drawer and produce on display, there was nothing to do but hurry up and wait, because no one came. What was the point of running around like a chicken with his head cut off just so he could stand here and look pretty with no one to admire him? He couldn’t even text Patrick to complain about how early they had to open, because David was the one who had made the No Cell Phones On The Floor policy. 

He wasn’t going to see Patrick until that evening. That was practically _all day_. Maybe he could sneak into the back for just a few minutes, David was thinking, as he straightened out the colognes. Then the bell rang; he turned around, and it was Patrick. Tension melted out of David like a stream. 

He hadn’t even known he’d been carrying any tension, and heat was clawing into his cheeks just at the unexpected sight of Patrick’s face, and oh God. _Glowing_. David remembered glowing, Patrick glowing when David had shown up at the store, and now David was doing the same thing, fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. This was a thing that happened, in new relationships—you got giddy over it; you got hopeful; you got strange. 

You got over it.

“Hi,” Patrick said, smiling, then came over to kiss David on the cheek—like this was casual already, everyday, _like a boyfriend_ , David’s mind whispered, and then Patrick was nudging a plastic bag into David’s hand. When Patrick pulled back and David looked in it, he saw containers of Tupperware. “Stromboli,” Patrick said. “And coffeecake.”

“Not a great combination.”

“Stromboli’s for lunch,” said Patrick. 

“And the coffeecake?”

“I don’t know; did you eat breakfast? Or did you roll out of bed and get here at a minute to nine?”

“Does _this_ look like I rolled out of bed?” David asked, indicating himself.

A smile threatened Patrick’s face. “I don’t know. I can’t tell.”

“Where’s the coffee?” David said, irritated.

The smile that had been threatening broke out helplessly. “Was I supposed to get you coffee?”

“Um, it’s coffee cake; doesn’t that go with—” David broke off, because he realized he was being an ungrateful brat, but really. Who got coffeecake without coffee? Opening the top Tupperware, David peeked inside. It looked like good coffee cake. “This isn’t from the café.”

“Gwen made it.”

 _I don’t know who Gwen is_ , David wanted to say, but it was too late. It was too late for that; he did know who Gwen was. “Why are you always feeding me?” he said instead.

“Why, don’t you like it?”

David closed the Tupperware, putting it back in the plastic bag. “I’m watching my weight.”

Patrick looked like he was about to say something, then stopped. “Okay,” he said instead. “Do you want me to take them back?”

Patrick reached for the bag, and David moved to defend it. “No, now that they’re here, I’m sure I can find a use for them.”

“Oh, a use for them,” Patrick repeated, the way he sometimes did when he was making fun of David, but then Patrick moved in to kiss him again, this time on the lips. It wasn’t one of Patrick’s devouring kisses; it was the softest, gentlest thing. He tasted like coffeecake, and when Patrick moved away David felt so pleased that he couldn’t look Patrick in the eyes.

“Thank you for bringing me things,” David said, rather weakly. “It’s supposed to be your day off.”

“Yeah, but I had things to say to you.”

The knot that was lying there loose and relaxed in David’s stomach suddenly twisted and tightened, ratcheting tension back up David’s spine and into his shoulders.

“Ray’s going to a poker game at Bob’s,” Patrick said, “Wednesday night. I was invited, but I said no. We could . . . we could use my room.” Patrick lifted his gaze, which had dropped sometime during the course of stumbling through this explanation.

“Ooh,” David said, putting his arms around Patrick’s neck, even though he was still holding the plastic bag. “‘Use your room,’” David repeated suggestively, giving Patrick a kiss.

“Yeah,” Patrick said, pulling back. His hands were light on David’s hips. “Apparently Bob has a semi-regular game; he’s starting up again. His garage also sponsors a baseball team, which—Gwen’s not on it. Seems strange to me. She actively recruited me in front of him last night. Over coffee cake.”

“Mm,” David hummed, not sure how much he should pretend to be interested in these stories, but it was very nice standing with his arms around Patrick like this.

“So,” Patrick said, “they asked us to the poker game, and I said no, but I said—I said yes to the team.”

“Mm-hm,” David said, because Patrick seemed to be waiting for acknowledgement.

“Practice is Tuesdays and Thursdays and games Saturdays. So I’ll be busy those nights, for the next two months, starting Thursday. I told them I couldn’t tomorrow night.”

“What are you doing tomorrow night?”

Patrick pulled back to give him a strange look. “We’re going to the Cookie Mill.”

“Oh,” David said, pleasure and embarrassment squeezing his throat like greedy hands, choking his breath away.

Patrick frowned. “Did you forget?”

“No,” David whispered. “I . . .” _You should go to your practice,_ David should say. _We can go to the Cookie Mill another time._ David should really say it; it was the polite, accommodating thing to say, but he wasn’t going to. He wasn’t going to say anything like that, because he kept imagining Patrick saying something in reply to Gwen’s _active recruitment_ , something like, _No, I can’t do that; I have a date with David._

Or maybe, _I can’t do that; I’m doing something very important that night._

Or maybe just a polite, _Sorry, I’m busy; I have a previous commitment._

The squeezing feeling collapsed down from David’s throat in a rush down David’s spine, drawing David’s whole body in with a thrum of excitement. “Did you say you had a previous commitment?”

“What?”

“Nothing,” David said quickly, because he realized this was childish. It was childish to be so thrilled to be someone’s _previous commitment._ Patrick probably had _previous commitments_ all the time. He was very organized; he probably had a calendar; he probably didn’t like to schedule things over each other, no matter what they were; it wasn’t a big deal for him to prioritize _previous commitments_ over other, newer things. _He’s not spontaneous,_ Stevie had said, and David thought that was an excellent quality, a truly excellent quality. Spontaneity was overrated. “Do you have a calendar?”

“David,” Patrick said, pulling away from his arms entirely. “What?”

“Nothing.” David was left foolishly holding the plastic bag with the Tupperware containers, but he didn’t know where to put it. He kept looking around for a place to put it, though, because if he looked at Patrick, he was going to smile.

“What is happening your brain right now?”

“Nothing,” David said again.

Patrick put his hands back on David’s hips, then kissed him lightly on the cheek. “Yes. I have a calendar.”

“Am I on it?” 

Patrick frowned again. “Do you think I’m going to forget dates with you?”

“No, just—am I on it? Do you put me on it?”

“Yes.” Patrick kissed him again. “I put you on it.”

“Can I see?” David asked breathlessly.

“What?”

“Can I see me on your calendar; can I—look at it?”

“David.” Patrick pulled back again, his face holding in a baffled smile. “Why?”

“Nothing. No reason.” David tried to pull Patrick in again, still holding the stupid plastic bag, but Patrick pulled away, reaching into his back pocket, taking out his phone.

Oh. It was a phone calendar. For some reason, David had imagined something beautiful in black ink on heavy cream-colored paper, but that was ridiculous, of course; Patrick didn’t own beautiful things. Almost all of Patrick’s things were ugly. Good thing he was so pretty—but then Patrick was putting his phone in David’s hand, coming around beside him to point to a box on the screen that said, _Eddie Q’s w David_. “There you are,” said Patrick.

“Oh,” David said, because it was sort of beautiful after all.

Patrick touched the arrow on the screen. The next day showed up, _Cookie Mill w David_ another box on the day. David touched the arrow for the next day. _Ray out_ , said the box. “This one doesn’t say me,” David said.

“Here, let me fix it,” Patrick said, taking away his phone, visibly swallowing laughter. When he gave back his phone, it said, _Ray out. Sex w David_ in the box. 

“Oh, so you wanted to have sex,” David said. 

“I mean, did you have other plans? I can cancel it.” Patrick reached for his phone, and David moved it away, touching the arrow for the next day. _Baseball practice_ , said the box. David touched the arrow for the next day. _3 weeks! Elmdale Lodge checkin @..._ said the box. “That one doesn’t say you either. Did you want me to—”

“No,” David said, moving the phone away again, touching the box to read the rest of the appointment. _5pm_ , it said, and in the box you could put further details for the appointment. _Checkout @ 11am_ , it said, but there weren’t other details. “Are we having sex this night too?”

“No, I thought we could do yodeling.”

“There’s space in this appointment box,” David pointed out. “You could write out what exactly you plan on doing.”

“Could I?”

Patrick seemed to find something really fucking funny about this, but David was serious. “Yes,” he said, pressing the arrow for the next day, which had the remainder of the Elmdale Lodge appointment on it, then _Game_ at six-thirty. Sunday had a box in the morning that said _Ray out,_ but it was while David was at work, so Patrick couldn’t put _sex w David_ in that box. David moved to the next day, which had several hour blocks during the day that again said _Ray out._ That day also had _Mom’s birthday_ on the top. “You keep great track of Ray,” David remarked.

Patrick didn’t say anything, and when David glanced up at him, Patrick was pink. “It’s not always easy to get—privacy,” Patrick said, his voice only a little tense, “living with Ray.”

David’s head snapped back to Patrick’s phone. He even touched the arrow to look at Sunday again, the big block of _Ray out_ in the morning. Fuck. _Sex w self_ , Patrick could put in the box. _Sex w shampoo._ Fuck. Fuck. Hastily, David skipped over Sunday and Monday, over into Tuesday next week. Patrick didn’t have Ray appointments on that day, probably because Patrick was back at work by that day. _Baseball_ was in the evening, though. Next Wednesday had a box with _Ray out_ in the evening again. “Ray’s gone next Wednesday,” David said.

“I told you, back when you weren’t listening to me, that the poker games were semi-regular.”

David bit his lip, still looking down at the box. “Are you going to put ‘sex double-you David’ in it?”

“Do you want me to make it recurring?” Patrick said, taking back his phone, and David couldn’t speak.

So he nodded.

Patrick did some things on his phone, his lips curling to one side, then handed it back to David.

 _Ray out. Sex w David,_ said the box.

Nine days. It was nine days from now. Patrick was planning to have sex with him _nine days from now_ , like he wasn’t already getting tired of this, wasn’t already thinking about how to end it. David’s heart crawled into his throat; he knew he was being ridiculous. Looking at that small appointment box on Patrick’s phone calendar shouldn’t make him feel this way, so he pressed the arrow for the next day.

Thursday had _baseball_. Friday had _Asbestos Fest_ , and David felt both relief and disappointment that there was not an excited little _week 4!_ beside it. Saturday had _call Elliott_ and _Game_ at six-thirty.

“Who’s Elliott?” David asked, touching the arrow for the next day.

“One of my cousins,” Patrick said, but David didn’t really hear, because Sunday had _1 month!_ in it. Patrick had stopped counting by weeks at that point; instead of four weeks, he’d matched the anniversary to the same numerical date of the previous month.

“You shouldn’t do that,” David said, abruptly giving Patrick back his phone.

“Do what?”

“Count days and weeks like that. With us.”

“There aren’t Barenaked Ladies songs about them, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“No,” said David, finally able to move away to put the plastic bag on the register counter. He wanted to put it in the stockroom, actually. The stromboli probably should be refrigerated. He didn’t want to look at Patrick anymore. “Just—keeping track like that. It’s not a good practice.”

“Why not?”

“It just—you’re setting up an expectation. You should just—let things . . . flow.”

“‘Flow.’”

“You don’t need to schedule everything, Patrick,” David said, a little irritably, picking up the plastic bag again. He was going to take it back to the stockroom after all, and then Patrick’s hand was on his, Patrick warm in his space.

“I’m going to schedule you,” Patrick said, kissing him.

“Mmf,” said David, surprised.

“I’m going to keep scheduling you until you tell me you don’t want to do things with me anymore.” Patrick kissed him again.

“Okay, well, don’t say _that_ either.”

“Then I’ll keep scheduling you.” Patrick kissed him again, hands going to David’s hips, tugging, then slipping back to David’s ass and squeezing. 

David felt his eyes widen.

At last Patrick pulled away, kissing David’s cheek, his temple. “Did you have a good time with Stevie last night?”

“Mm. Mm-hm. Did you have a good time with—stromboli?”

“Eat it,” Patrick said, then scraped his teeth on David’s jaw. “Then tell me what you think.”

Well, fuck. Why was Patrick so hot; David thought he might melt into a puddle of goo. “What are you doing today?” he asked, because he wanted to keep Patrick talking so Patrick wouldn’t leave.

Patrick didn’t seem like he wanted to leave. His teeth were still doing things on David’s jaw. “Pizza. With a hot guy. Wanna come?”

David tried not to react to that, like a blush was something you could put in a pill and swallow whole. “I meant, during the day today.”

“How come you always want to know what I’m doing?”

“Because you’re . . . you’re like a mystery to me.”

Hot breath huffed against David’s cheek. “I’m not a mystery.”

“You are; you’re . . . a pretty little mystery, with no belts on weekends and Tupperware from the seventies.”

“It’s my grandmother’s Tupperware,” Patrick said, kissing along David’s jaw. “No one’s ever called me pretty before.”

David pulled away from Patrick to look at him in consternation. “No one?”

“I was kidding,” Patrick said, pulling him back. “People call me pretty all the time.”

David pulled back in even more consternation. “Who?” he demanded.

“Oh, everyone,” Patrick said, pulling him back again. “I get stopped on the street to get told I’m pretty.”

“I can’t tell whether you’re serious,” David complained.

“I get told that a lot too,” Patrick said, pulling David closer, kissing him.

He shouldn’t be allowed to get away with being evasive, just because he was so cute and—well, _persuasive_ , but David was kissing him back before his thoughts caught up—thoughts about how Patrick would never say what he was doing, whether he’d ever had a girlfriend who told him he was pretty, whether she was the one who’d said she couldn’t tell if he was serious. Maybe she’d been the one to tell him he was annoying, because of this, because of the way he deflected and sometimes wouldn’t let you see inside him.

David wanted to see inside him. He wanted to see everything, but he remembered the warm thing in his chest, something young and delicate that he had to protect, and he thought that it would not be a good idea to break Patrick open. Patrick had put David in his personal calendar. 

Pulling away from Patrick’s mouth, David said, kind of in a rush, “I need Wednesday off.”

“What?” Patrick pulled back, blinking.

“Of work,” David said. “I have—an appointment. And some errands I have to do.”

“What appointment?”

“Just an appointment.”

“Okay,” Patrick said slowly. “You still want to come over Wednesday night?”

“For sex? Yes.” David nodded vigorously. 

Patrick suppressed a smile. “I mean. We’re allowed to talk as well. And eat.”

“No,” said David. “The calendar says sex. We can only have sex.”

“Oh, because the calendar says?” Patrick let the smile out then, his big eyes all lit up, his hands settling on David’s hips where they belonged.

“Mm-hm.”

“Maybe I should put other things I want on the calendar,” Patrick said. 

“Sex is what I want. You said to say what I want.”

“I did.” Patrick nuzzled a bit behind David’s ear.

“I like that it’s on the calendar.”

“Oh, do you?” Patrick teased. “I thought you were indifferent.”

“I also want coffee,” David said.

Patrick pulled back enough to look at him. 

“To go with my coffeecake,” David said. “You said to say what I want.”

Patrick’s face was doing that thing where it was so appalled by David that it was incredulous, and the incredulity was so extreme that Patrick was swallowing laughter.

“I’m not saying you have to get it for me,” David pointed out. “You just told me to say what I wanted.”

“I did,” Patrick marveled, shaking his head. “I did say that.”

“And I want the meat lover’s pizza,” said David. “Tonight, at Eddie Q’s.”

Patrick seemed to think this was so funny that he actually bit his lip. His eyes were _shining_. This boy had a problem.

“I don’t understand why you think it’s so funny,” David said. “You told me to tell you, so I’m telling you.”

“Uh-huh.” Patrick’s voice sounded kind of high, too choked with swallowed laughter. “And is there—anything else you want? While we’re at it?”

David thought about this. “Sundays off?”

“Nope.” Patrick pressed his lips over a grin. His eyes were still shining.

“So, you don’t actually want to give me what I want.”

“Oh, I want to,” Patrick said, crowding up against him again, grabbing David’s ass again. Patrick’s lips brushed against David’s. “I just think you want to be told no sometimes. I think you like it.”

“No, I don’t,” David lied, very softly, because there were times when Patrick was almost incandescently hot, and this was one of them.

“Are you sure?” Patrick whispered.

“Maybe—maybe you should try it,” David breathed.

“Nope,” Patrick said, pulling away. Then he actually—literally—lightly— _casually_ —slapped David’s ass, and David jumped about a foot.

Oh fuck.

“Imma go get that coffee,” Patrick said, turning away.

 _Please do me! Do me hard!_ David wanted to shout after him, but it was immature, not to mention super ineloquent, and Patrick would just laugh at him anyway. Laugh at him hotly. Oh God. The bell dinged as Patrick left, and David wanted to crawl out of his _bones_ , Patrick was so attractive, and Patrick liked him; Patrick liked him so much. David put his hands on his face. It was smiling and about a thousand degrees Celsius. Patrick. Patrick Patrick Patrick Patrick. Oh God.

Picking up the plastic bag, David tried to distract himself by putting the stromboli Tupperware in the refrigerator in the cooler room. Then he put the coffeecake with his things in the stockroom, where he couldn’t stop thinking about that slap on the ass and the way that Patrick _looked_ at him and it was too much. It was too much; David needed a wall. He needed a corner to close him in. He went to the make-out space and pressed himself into the corner of it, the metal struts biting into his sides. His legs wouldn’t hold him up, so he slid down until his knees were bent in front of him, and then he put his hand in the neck of his sweater and found the bite mark, pressed his nails into it; the mark was fading but it still felt good. 

It felt really good. David closed his eyes. He felt really, really good, except his chest was closing in on itself; his sweater was too hot; he was still too exposed; his nail in the bite mark wasn’t painful enough to distract him, and he couldn’t get enough air. He liked Patrick so much. He liked him too much. This feeling felt as though it would burst from his skin, too big to hold, too big to control. It would make him stupid, this feeling, stupid and headlong and crazy; he didn’t like it. He didn’t like it. He wanted to get away from it. He wanted to _get away_.

Pressing into the mark with his fingernails, David breathed and got away. He got as far away as he could, away from those thoughts, away from Patrick and from wanting; he thought about sunscreen. The sunscreen wasn’t selling all that well—which was a problem; people should use sunscreen. Protecting skin was important. People didn’t realize how much, but maybe that was because he had put it next to the lotions, and people thought lotion was not essential. David didn’t understand how people could think that, but Patrick had informed him of this. _It’s a luxury item_ , said the man who used _lotion_ to masturbate, as though masturbation was not essential. But whatever, perhaps the sunscreen would sell better if it was with the essentials? Next to the ugly bug repellant. This placement seemed unfair to the sunscreen. It had _moisturizer_. Sondra should make a bug repellant with moisturizer. And make the bug repellant a prettier color.

David’s heart was slowing. Even thinking about Patrick’s uses for lotion, the rush was subsiding. These things happened sometimes, the seed of anxiety that lived in his brain ballooning into a sudden bubble of alarm. It just happened. _Chemicals spikes can occur in your system_ , Doctor Evans used to say.

 _It’s a panic attack,_ Ted had said.

Was he Doctor Ted? What was Ted’s last name? Alexis would know. David couldn’t ask Alexis Ted’s last name; Doctor Ted it was. This wasn’t a panic attack. That other time had lasted hours and hours; it had never happened before, but this—this happened all the time. It was a _chemical spike_ , possibly because Patrick had slapped him on the ass; it was nothing. He’d try moving the sunscreen to the back.

When the bell rang ten minutes later, David felt fine. He felt normal. He came out the stockroom and it was Patrick, and David felt perfectly fine.

“As you wished,” Patrick said, presenting David with the coffee, which he took.

“No one came in,” David said.

“Maybe we need to do more advertising.”

“Advertising is gauche.” David opened his coffee and blew on it.

Patrick suppressed another smile at him. “I thought you were going to drink that with your coffeecake.”

“Don’t you have to go do your mystery-things? Mystery-Patrick things?”

“I’m going grocery shopping,” said Patrick. “Then I’m going to do my laundry. Then I might mow Ray’s lawn, and go over our budget, and then read up on some tax law. I’m going to have left-over stromboli for lunch. Does that solve your mystery?”

“No,” said David. “You’re not going to take pictures of more doors?”

“Maybe.”

“Uh-huh. Can I have a picture of you mowing the lawn?”

Patrick’s brows shot up. “Are those the ‘specifications’ you mentioned? Lawn-mowing?”

“No.” David sipped his coffee. Then he thought of something else. “Can I have a picture of you doing laundry?”

That incredulous marveling was back. “What about a picture of me studying tax law?”

“Yes.” David took another sip of coffee. “I do want that also.”

“What do you want me to do, ask Ray to take these photos? He’ll probably charge.”

David considered this. “I’d pay.”

Letting out this helpless little chuckle, Patrick shook his head. “You are so . . .”

“So what?” David sipped his coffee.

Patrick just shook his head again. “You know, it’s not fair if you get all these pictures of me if I don’t get them of you.”

“I don’t do lawns.”

“I’d settle for just—a picture of you,” Patrick said. “Doing anything. A current one, I mean.”

“I don’t do cameras.” 

“Huh,” Patrick said, possibly because he knew David was lying. Possibly he knew David had been in front of many cameras, more than David cared to remember. Of course Patrick knew. Google existed.

David sipped his coffee some more.

“Ever?” was all Patrick said.

“I don’t know,” said David. “Maybe if you asked very nicely. And I looked particularly hot that day.”

“Huh,” Patrick said again, and David’s eyes slid away.

 _You can slap my ass again,_ he didn’t say. _I’m ready for it now_. “Don’t you have—grocery shopping?” he said, a little bit too loudly.

“Yeah,” Patrick said slowly. He came over and kissed David’s cheek. “You’re a mystery to me too, David Rose.”

“Yes. Man of mystery. That’s me.” David pulled away a little so he could have more coffee. It was very calming; his system was so inured to caffeine that it made him feel settled inside, instead of hyped. Maybe one day his system would become inured to Patrick, and he would feel calm inside, instead of—this.

“Did you want your coffeecake?” Patrick asked. “I can watch the store while if you need to eat.”

“It’s your day off. You’re not supposed to work.”

“You always work on your days off.” Patrick tried to kiss him again, and David stepped away.

“I didn’t work on Saturday,” David pointed out. “And I’m taking Wednesday off. You said you needed your days off.”

“Yeah,” Patrick said, stepping away. “Yeah.” Then he ran his hand over the back of his hair, as though that could ever need smoothing; it was so short back there. 

Patrick still didn’t leave, and David could feel the smile begin on his face. He didn’t know why Patrick wasn’t leaving, but he was standing there like he was trying to make himself, but he couldn’t.

“Have a good day, David,” Patrick said abruptly, turning to head toward the door.

“I’m serious about the lawn-mowing picture,” David called out after him.

“We’ll see,” Patrick called back. He didn’t really look over his shoulder, as though afraid if he did, he might stay.

The smile still pulled at David’s face. Wow. Patrick had it bad. David finished his coffee.

*

**Eddie Q’s w David**

The date was good, almost like a normal date, like you saw on TV, like normal people had, like this was just a regular thing Patrick and David did that they both enjoyed.

Patrick picked him up by rolling up to the motel and honking his horn, which David had thought was a joke the first time Patrick did it, but now David was beginning to think that Patrick thought this was acceptable behavior. Patrick just laughed. “Acceptable behavior?” he asked, pulling out, and David tried to explain to him that civilized people got out of the car and knocked, and Patrick laughed at him some more.

David didn’t understand why he liked this person. 

When Patrick was finally done mocking him, silence filled the car, and David realized he was now faced with the prospect of Patrick’s horrible little CD binder. A _CD binder_. As David looked in the back for the wretched thing, he realized he’d better not look too hard or else he’d stumble upon Patrick’s _pocket protectors_.

“Not even gonna check what I have in the CD player?” 

David turned to Patrick, who was looking very suspect, even though he was dutifully watching the road. “M‘kay,” David said, equally suspicious. “Was it picked specifically as an instrument of torture?”

“Torture?” Patrick feigned hurt. “Why would my music be torture?”

This was a trick. David should have smelled the hot water. Then he opened his mouth, and words came out. “Because I know what kind of music you like.”

Patrick gave him this smile, this highly amused, laughing-at-him smile, and David felt like he should be offended by it, but Patrick laughing at him was different than other people laughing at him. Patrick laughing at him looked like _you make me laugh_ and Patrick’s whole face and body and person in general always looked like _I love laughing._ “And here I thought I thought I was a mystery,” Patrick said.

“Your taste in music isn’t a mystery,” David said, lifting his nose into the air, because this kind of behavior was also laughable or off-putting or something else bad, and David wanted to see what Patrick would do.

Patrick, the foolish human, seemed further delighted by the arrogance. “Oh, it’s not?”

“Patrick, you have George Strait. In a CD binder.”

In fact, Patrick seemed rather _disproportionately_ delighted. “Why don’t you just see what’s in there?”

“Is it Reba McEntire?”

“Maybe you’ll never know.”

“Because you are behaving _very_ oddly.”

Patrick cracked up, and David was so suspicious at this point that he jabbed the stereo with a very angry finger, and Mariah Carey’s “Love Takes Time” from _Mariah Carey_ came on. David’s jaw dropped almost in time to the music, which was slow, as he turned to Patrick, who just thought this was so, so so fucking funny. Patrick was pretty when he laughed that way, almost devastatingly pretty, and this song was so, so sad. It felt surreal to hear it here with Patrick in his ugly Toyota, like another world was touching this one—not colliding but sliding in slowly, merging, the way light slowly filled a room in the morning when you had a window that faced east, and the warmth became one with the room. David reached his finger back out and switched it off.

“Hey,” Patrick said. “I haven’t gotten to hear the end of that one yet.”

“You said you didn’t know who Mariah Carey was.”

“I said I thought I did know who she was.”

“Where was this CD?”

“What do you mean?”

“Alexis looked at all your CDs,” David said impatiently. “She would have said something if she knew you had—if she had seen it.”

“I bet she would have,” Patrick said slowly, “if I had had it when Alexis was looking at my CDs.”

“You mean you bought it? Between then and now?”

“You said you loved Mariah Carey.”

That was two days ago. Patrick had literally gone out and bought a CD in the last two days because David had said he liked something? “Why would you do that?” David asked.

“Do what?” Patrick turned away from the road for a moment to glance at him, startled.

“Where would you even buy a CD, in this, the modern era?”

“The internet? I bought a digital copy and burned it.”

This made David feel a little better than Patrick going out to—what? a _record store?_ —and buying a CD. “People still burn CDs?” was all David said.

“I think we have established I am a child of the early 2000s.”

“Then use your phone, like a real millennial.”

“You know I don’t have Bluetooth.”

“Buy a cable.”

“Okay, David.”

 _Don’t okay David!_ David wanted to yell, then realized he still might be kind of unsettled that Patrick had bought and burned a CD just because David had said he liked it.

“Are we really not listening to it?” Patrick asked, after another moment.

“Um,” said David.

Patrick’s hand reached out toward the stereo, and David batted it away before he could think about it. It was kind of a dickly thing to do, and David could feel Patrick’s expression—that confused, inquiring face, a furrow in his brow. “It makes me,” David tried to explain, then had to start again. “I feel too many things about it.”

“Okay,” Patrick said. “I’ll listen to it when you’re not around.”

David twisted, turning to face him in the car. “But why?”

“Why what?”

“Why would you listen to it? It’s not—it’s not your thing.”

A little smile tugged the corner of Patrick’s mouth, but he kept looking at the road as he drove. “Maybe you don’t know what my thing is.”

David was . . . almost a little hurt by this. He knew Patrick’s thing; he _liked_ Patrick’s thing, that it was different than David’s, with the baseball and the blue jeans and the Old Spice.

“David,” Patrick said eventually, after a long moment. The smile was gone now. “I don’t know what my thing is. I didn’t know, until I—I met you.”

 _Don’t say things like that!_ went David’s brain. It was too good; it was too nice; David wanted to listen to Mariah Carey. He might cry.

Speaking of feeling too many things.

“I want to try new things,” said Patrick, “with you; I want to try things you like. I want to learn about you. Is that so hard to believe?”

 _Yes! Don’t learn too much!_ David’s mind felt like it was churning through something painful, but he didn’t want to think about it. He wanted to think about what Patrick had said; he wanted to live in it like a pool of warm, scented water, like something that would cling to him after the water all drained away, like something that would sink in and become brand new skin. “Her self-titled album is good,” was all David said. “It’s not her best.”

“I wasn’t sure,” said Patrick. “I was going chronological.”

“Don’t,” said David.

Patrick seemed to find this funny too, because he was smiling again. “Are you going to tell me the Mariah Carey I _should_ listen to? Or am I supposed to guess?”

“I’ll give you a list.”

“Oh, you’re so generous.”

“Yes.” David leaned across and kissed him, mostly on one of Patrick’s ears because it was the easiest to reach and David adored Patrick’s ears; they were so small and stunted. When David pulled away, Patrick was smiling, and David ejected Mariah Carey’s _Mariah Carey_ and put in one of Patrick’s awful Guster CDs, because even though it was awful David had never actually listened to any Guster. He put Mariah Carey lovingly in the empty pocket, even though she did not belong here among these country folk rock hipster greats.

“Oh, so we’re doing my music now?” said Patrick.

“Mm, you said all those nice things. It’s the least I can do.”

Patrick laughed, and David felt proud of himself for it and warm. Then he put his hand on Patrick’s thigh, because Patrick liked him, and he could.

*

“So I was listening to that Mariah Carey album,” Patrick said, once they’d ordered the pizza. “You don’t think it’s her best because it’s a breakup album?”

“It’s not a breakup album,” David said, very defensive of Mariah Carey’s _Mariah Carey_ , even if it _wasn’t_ her best.

“Pretty sure it’s a breakup album,” Patrick said, and David could not believe he was discussing Mariah Carey with Patrick at a pizza parlor. It sounded like a cheap little fantasy, and David was deeply thrilled by it.

“‘There’s Got To Be A Way.’”

“A way for what?” said Patrick.

“I mean the song, ‘There’s Got To Be A Way.’ That’s not a breakup song.”

“What’s that one again? Remind me.”

So David told him about ‘There’s Got To Be A Way,’ which was a song about people helping each other. “It’s about race and hunger and homelessness, but it’s about hope. She’s saying there’s got to be a way to be better than what we are.”

Patrick didn’t say anything, but he had his elbows on the table, his hand kind of over his mouth, as though he didn’t want David to see him laughing.

“What?” David asked, offended.

“Nothing.” Patrick took his hand away, and then David could see that the smile was so, so fond, and Patrick’s eyes were gooey almost, that look Alexis had said was like a puppy. “I just never imagined I’d be talking about Mariah Carey with David Rose in a pizza parlor.”

This sentiment energized David, who went on. “‘Sent From Up Above’ also isn’t a breakup song.”

“I do remember that one,” said Patrick. “It’s about God.” 

“It’s not about God.”

“It’s definitely about God.”

“It’s not about God,” said David. “It’s just about how—like, he’s so good and they’re so perfect together that it was sent from up above, and I’m realizing as I say this that ‘above’ is God and are you really analyzing Mariah Carey right now?”

“You don’t want me to analyze Mariah Carey?”

“No, I—you can continue.”

“I won’t do it if you don’t want me to,” Patrick said. “Some people like to just listen to songs.”

“It depends on your analysis, really,” said David. “I mean, if you’re wrong and stupid, I’m going to think you’re wrong and stupid.”

A smile slid onto Patrick’s face as though he didn’t mean for it to, and he just sat there for a moment looking so amusedly fond that David realized what he had said was kind of nonsensical, even though it was true. He wasn’t going to back down.

“Okay, David,” Patrick said, and David realized that now that he had given Patrick permission to say that, Patrick was going to be the brat he always was and say it as much as possible. David should take his permission back, but then Patrick was saying that the fact that ‘There Got To Be A Way’ was about society actually made it a breakup song, because after a breakup you went through these stages. They weren’t the stages David was expecting; they were entirely different stages, Patrick-defined stages, stages David hadn’t heard anyone else talk about. “And then you start to get depressed about the whole world,” Patrick was saying. “Like, you just think about everything that’s wrong in the world and society and with humanity, because you feel—like you notice everything that’s broken. It feels like nothing could ever work; why did you think it could, when it’s all messed up to begin with.”

 _Who broke up with you?_ David wanted to ask, because he didn’t see how anyone could possibly break up with Patrick. David couldn’t imagine doing that to Patrick, making him feel this way, but Patrick had said _lock it up_ , and maybe that was really for the better. Even though Patrick didn’t sound upset about it, he was saying sad things, and David didn’t want to think about Patrick being with other people. 

“I don’t want to talk about breakups,” was what David said, and Patrick’s face went soft. He was like a stick of butter.

“We don’t have to,” Patrick said, putting both hands open on the table, reaching toward him. 

Obediently, David put his hands in Patrick’s, heat crawling up from his collar, because holding hands in a pizza parlor, _wow_. It was embarrassing and one of the nicest things David had ever experienced, and then Patrick was lifting up a little and leaning across to kiss him. After Patrick sat back down, David immediately looked around to see whether anyone had noticed, having no idea whether he wanted anyone to or not, then looking back down at their interlaced hands for lack of better places to look.

They had to take their hands apart when the pizza came, which was the only thing, really, that could have convinced David to let go, because the pizza was meat lover’s, and this date was possibly the most perfect date he’d ever been on.

*

Afterwards, Patrick dropped David off at the motel, which was the only part that wasn’t perfect. Fifties boyfriends had seemed very hot before Patrick had made David come three times in a row, but now it seemed kind of inadequate and just a little miserable. When David got back to the motel room he changed into his pyjamas, did his facial routine, and argued with Alexis for a while before remembering today was her first day of school. He’d forgotten to ask about it, and then he accidentally made her drop the laptop.

“Ugh! David!”

“Is everything all right in there?” Dad called.

“Some of us are trying to sleep!” called Mom.

David wanted to tell Alexis he was sorry, except it wasn’t like she paid attention to his life either, so instead he threw himself on his bed and checked his phone. Maybe Patrick had texted.

He had texted, but the text he had sent was a picture that had been taken in front of the backdrop that Ray used for his professional photos. Patrick was sitting on a stool, looking very staged, with a laundry basket in front of him. He was wearing the clothes he’d been wearing earlier that day—jeans, no belt, a t-shirt that David remembered from earlier today because it was ugly and Patrick’s arms were not to be forgotten. Patrick was grinning and folding a different t-shirt like the literal _gremlin_ he was. 

David wanted to text him to tell him he was a literal gremlin, except Patrick didn’t deserve a text, and also he might be sleeping. “I’m sorry,” David said, putting his phone aside.

“Um,” said Alexis. “For being a jerk?”

“Is the laptop broken?” It probably wasn’t. Alexis had put it back on the table and was tapping at it like a disturbed bird. A binder and her textbooks were piled all around. He should have remembered school was today. “How was class?” David asked, when she didn’t answer.

Alexis looked like she didn’t want to, but she smiled her little smile, the one that pushed her mouth to the side. “There’s this thing called supply and demand. It means you can make all the demands you want and it’s better if I supply less.”

“I don’t think that’s what that means.”

“That’s what the professor said.”

“What were they like?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t see her.”

“Was she invisible?” David asked, moving his head to try to get his brain around this concept.

“It’s an online course.”

“So—you didn’t even _go_ to a class?” David had to move his head some more, since this counted as several additional concepts.

“If you had ever _asked_ , you would know that when I went to register there was a sad little building with sad little signs and it wasn’t anything like the brochure, and a sad little DJ told me I could take my courses online, so that’s what I’m doing.”

“That’s a sad little story.”

“Um, not it isn’t. I’m going to get my degree in four months.”

David had been about to pick up his phone again, but now he stopped to look at her. “I thought it took a year or something.”

“Gwen is helping me test out of some things.”

“Gwen.”

“She’s my tutor, which you would know if you ever paid attention to anyone but yourself.”

Since this was too irritating to even bother to dispute, David reached for his phone again, but put it down without looking. “Four months is really short.”

“I’m taking a whole bunch of courses at once.”

“Isn’t that a lot of work?”

“I once partially negotiated the settlement of a border dispute that was disrupting the entire economic climate of Mongolia? So I think I can handle it.”

“I never said you couldn’t.”

Alexis made a face at him. “You can go back to sexting Patrick.”

“I wasn’t sexting,” David said, but he looked down at his phone.

The bottom half of Patrick’s picture was visible—the laundry basket, his hands. David scrolled up to see the rest of Patrick, those shoulders and the shirt-folding and that gleefully mocking smile. David touched the picture, filling the screen with it, then pinched and slid to zoom in on Patrick’s smile, his big brown eyes, that indentation in one cheek that didn’t quite make a dimple. Oh God. David’s face hurt.

“What’s he saying?” Alexis asked.

“Nothing,” David said, putting down his phone. Turning over in bed, David put his back to Alexis, thinking he should go to sleep.

This was a problem. A really big problem. What else was he going to forget, lose track of, let go of because he was obsessed, too obsessed with this? It wasn’t healthy. He knew it wasn’t healthy. _Fixation_ , Dr. Chew had called it. _Overcome your fixations._ David closed his eyes tightly. 

David just had to ride this through until it passed. It would pass, just like everything else. This kind of intensity was impossible for any human being to maintain, and books and movies and everything called this love, but love was a thing that could last forever and did. It was something that lasted through storms and heartache and two children and a drinking problem and a career ending and a loss of your entire fortune. 

This, what David was feeling, this wasn’t love; it was a frenzied series of chemicals meant to result in procreation. Love was in fact not about procreation at all but about longevity, protecting you from monsters in the dark and storms and starvation, because through sheer numbers humans could survive longer working together. Love was a length of time, and obsession was a blast of oxygen; both could help you live but only one could keep you alive for good. 

Too much oxygen could kill you. You needed other things to stay alive as well to temper the thing you needed most. Too much oxygen caused fires.

The next day there would be cookies.

*

**Cookie Mill w David**

The next day there were not cookies.

Patrick’s car got a flat tire on the way to Elmdale—which Patrick knew how to change, which David found sexy. Patrick also had a weird tools—a jack and a lug wrench, Patrick said—and a spare, which David also found sexy; Patrick was _prepared_ , even though it meant the Cookie Mill closed before they could get there. 

Patrick seemed put out by this, but David couldn’t help but feel a little pleased; they found a horrid roadside diner where all the food was disgusting, but it was a roadside diner, and David sat beside Patrick in the booth and put his legs in Patrick’s lap. Even though David didn’t really fit, when David tried to take his legs back off because the whole thing was awkward, Patrick held him down with his strong, far-too-white arms. David wanted to sit in seedy roadside diners with Patrick forever, or at least until Patrick’s car got its tires replaced, and it was still one of the nicer dates David had been on. Two for two this week, and they’d barely even started.

Alexis was still awake when David got back to the motel, the laptop and her books spread out before her, the laptop appearing no worse for wear.

“How was school today?” David asked, because he was a good brother. Dad had said so.

“We’re doing wants and needs,” said Alexis, glancing up from the laptop.

“Wants and needs?” David asked, getting his pyjamas out of the drawer.

“Like you _want_ a manicure, but you _need_ fingernails.”

“Ew,” said David. “No one should need fingernails. Everyone should already have fingernails.”

“Except for people who don’t have fingernails,” said Alexis. “Some people aren’t born with everything, David; they have needs. You could be a little more sensitive.”

“Patrick told me not everyone needs cuticle cream,” David said.

“Wrong,” said Alexis.

“I know,” said David.

“How was he?”

“Good. We got a flat tire.”

“Is that some kind of sex thing?” Alexis made a face. “Because if it is, I don’t want to—”

“We _literally_ got a flat tire,” said David. “How come you’re always asking about Patrick and I and sex? It’s disturbing.”

“You were so sad when you first got together.”

“I wasn’t _sad_.”

“I don’t know, David. I’m just pretending to be interested in your life. What else do you do together?”

“We do lots together. We have a store, for starters.”

“But that’s boring.”

“And we talk about things,” David said, feeling like this was strangely important.

“Like what? You have, literally, _nothing_ in common.”

“We have things in common,” said David, stung.

“Like what?”

“Um.” David tried to think through things he talked about with Patrick, underwear and cheeseburger casserole and . . . what else had they talked about today? They had talked almost all day at the store, except that David didn’t remember any of it, not specifically, other than it had been nice. It had been so nice, and Patrick said he liked David in his lap, and they’d talked about tires, except that wasn’t interesting, and they’d talked about Alexis, but he couldn’t tell her that, and—“ _The Outsiders_ ,” said David. “We talked about _The Outsiders_ , and Mariah Carey.”

“Patrick doesn’t like Mariah Carey,” Alexis said, flipping her hair again.

“Shows what you know,” David said, picking up his pyjamas and heading toward the bathroom. He needed to shower, because even though he hadn’t changed a tire, Patrick had touched him with his dirty tire hands, and the road they’d been on had been dusty, and he felt gross.

“Well, it’s nice he’s pretending to be interested,” said Alexis. “That means he likes you.”

“Does that mean you like me?” David asked.

“You pretended to be interested in me first.”

“Only so you wouldn’t drop the laptop again,” David said.

“Who dropped the laptop?” Dad called suddenly from the other room.

“Ugh!” said Alexis, glaring at David, who quickly shut the bathroom door and turned on the shower, so if Dad came in to yell at them David could claim that he was naked.

*

 **David:** We have things in common right

By the time David got out of the shower, Alexis was asleep and David was texting in the dark.

 **Patrick:** So many things

David was trying to think of a response, like _I thought so_ or _just making sure_ , before he realized Patrick was being sarcastic, because Patrick had already mentioned this. He’d mentioned this at Stevie’s, just before having sex. After having sex? Sometime in there. There’d been a lot of sex, and Patrick had said something about how he thought that David would get bored of him because David didn’t like spreadsheets.

 **David:** I like spreadsheets  
**David:** And calendars

 _And fucking,_ David thought, because he was pretty sure it was something they had in common, but he didn’t say it.

 **David:** Are you pretending to be interested in Mariah carey

 **Patrick:** no  
**Patrick:** I am genuinely interested in Mariah carey  
**Patrick:** Im interested in things you are interested in. Where is this coming from

 **David:** nothing  
**David:** sorry

 **Patrick:** Forget I ever said that about the spreadsheets  
**Patrick:** I was being stupid

 **David:** ok  
**David:** But I do like them

 **Patrick:** Ok. I have never once seen you use a calendar tho

 **David:** I use them I have a bujo

 **Patrick:** What’s a bujo

 **David:** Its great you’d love it

 **Patrick:** Ok what is it

 **David:** Ill make you one

 **Patrick:** Bullet journal?

 **David:** Why did you do google

 **Patrick:** Bc you said you’d make me one

 **David:** Yes so you didn’t need to google

 **Patrick:** Idk if I would use one of these

 **David:** Yes you would they’re gorgeous

 **Patrick:** Right I would say beauty is not my prime motivator when it comes to organization

 **David:** What’s the point of being organized then

 **Patrick:** Oh you’re right being on time knowing whats going on and being able to find things quickly is nothing to the aesthetic 

**David:** Glad you see things my way

 **Patrick:** These seem very involved

 **David:** Are you still googling bujos stop

 **Patrick:** Why? They’re kind of mesmerizing

 **David:** That’s why you should stop I want to make you one

 **Patrick:** But I’m not sure id use it

 **David:** You would bc it’s mine

 **Patrick:** That’s what you said about the lube but here I am  
**Patrick:** lubeless

 **David:** I’m working on it

 **Patrick:** It’s lube what do you need to work on

 **David:** nothing

 **Patrick:** You forgot didn’t you

 **David:** no

 **Patrick:** Just be careful what you tell me  
**Patrick:** I forget nothing

 **David:** I didn’t forget

 **Patrick:** I was jk you don’t need to give me anthropology  
**Patrick:** Anything!

 **David:** You never gave me a pic of you

 **Patrick:** I gave you like 5

 **David:** The one with gwen doesn’t count and you know it

 **Patrick:** What about all those doors

 **David:** Ig doesn’t count either

 **Patrick:** I noticed you didn’t unfriend me

 **David:** You don’t friend people on ig I have explained this

 **Patrick:** You still didn’t tho

 **David:** You could send me a pic of you in that tank from today

 **Patrick:** Tank?  
**Patrick:** You mean my undershirt?  
**Patrick:** I didn’t know you were into that

Patrick had taken off his ugly dress shirt so that he didn’t ruin it with tire dirt. On the one hand, David had been sad, because that dress shirt should die in a fire. On the other hand, David had been happy, because Patrick looked extremely fetching in a white tank top, and David might have had several hapless motorist fantasies where Patrick stopped to do something sexy with a radiator. Whatever a radiator was.

 **David:** I was very into it

 **Patrick:** You didn’t say anything

 **David:** What do you expect me to say. I want to do you over the hood of your car? 

There was a long pause, and David was kind of nervous about it, thinking maybe he shouldn’t have texted that, but he was getting kind of used to this. Patrick was slower, more hesitant over the phone, as though without their bodies to reassure him, he didn’t know what to do.

 **Patrick:** I’m not sure I know any adult who says ‘do you’

 **David:** What should I have said. Fuck you?

Another long pause, and David really regretted it then.

 **Patrick:** yes

 **David:** I wanted to fuck you over the hood of your car

David swiped it fast and pressed send before he could talk himself out of it.

 **Patrick:** yes

David’s heart began to thud.

 **Patrick:** I think I’m going to stop texting now

The thudding stopped, David’s heart catching in a single long moment of David staring at _stop texting now_.

 **David:** ok

David texted that too before he could think, because he had said the wrong thing. It was wrong; he’d gone too far, but he hadn’t; Patrick had asked him to. He’d asked him to. David looked back over the texts: _I wanted to fuck you, yes, I’m going to stop_. Didn’t David deserve some kind of explanation? 

**Patrick:** Let me be clear here I’m going to take a shower. So I can think of you while I’m in it

David breathed. And breathed. And breathed again. This kind of texting was not good for his health.

 **David:** Ok but don’t use shampoo

 **Patrick:** I would be using your lube if you had given me any

Patrick was such an asshole.

 **David:** Ok good night

 **Patrick:** Good night david  
**Patrick:** You make me feel really good

 **David:** So do you  
**David:** That sounds like I meant you make me feel good but no I meant you make you feel good  
**David:** In the shower

David waited for Patrick to acknowledge the joke, but no reply came. Patrick was probably in the shower by now, and David went back and read the texts from that night again. His face hurt from smiling, and David had said, _I wanted to fuck you_ and Patrick had said _yes_ and then _yes_ again, and Patrick was taking a shower. 

Patrick was naked and wet with hot water pouring on him and soap and he was going to get his pretty pink skin all slippery and David wished he could feel it, Patrick slippery and pinning him to the wall of a shower and touching him and Patrick’s hot wet cock against him, fucking him, or maybe Patrick could get David’s cock slick too and hold their cocks together, or maybe Patrick could turn him around and do him from behind, or maybe David wanted to think about Patrick alone in the shower, actually, touching himself and thinking of David, thinking of things he wanted to do to David, or things he wanted David to do to him; Patrick could be slicking up his ass; his fingers could be inside himself; his other hand could be on his dick and he could be jerking himself and thinking of David, thinking of David on his knees before him, or behind him with his dick inside of him; there were literally too many possibilities and Patrick was touching himself, touching himself thinking of David, and nothing this hot had ever happened to David before except for all the other things that had and on second thought, _Alexis_ was sleeping right _there_. David should not be having these thoughts with Alexis right there. Ew. Gross. 

Why did he live here? With her? Why had he thought about all of that until he was hard, with nowhere to go? Literally nowhere to go? He couldn’t even take another shower; Alexis would wake up and know what he was doing and why he was doing it. David thought about reading the texts again—just to cool down, because Patrick was funny and humor would solve this problem, right? But David knew it was a lie; he’d just think about Patrick and go down that whole shower drain again; he had to not think about Patrick. He had to not think about Patrick.

 _Sex w David_ wasn’t until tomorrow night, and David had to not think about Patrick until then.

David slid out of the texts from Patrick and touched another contact.

 **David:** Send me an unsexy thought

 **Stevie:** This is a decidedly unsexy text

 **David:** That’s good continue

 **Stevie:** I am not your 11pm erection killer

 **David:** Yes you are you’re doing it right now

 **Stevie:** I feel used

 **David:** Ok that’s a little hot

 **Stevie:** You’re disgusting

 **David:** I know  
**David:** That’s also kind of hot

 **Stevie:** You’re so easy

 **David:** This is also hot pls move on

 **Stevie:** You’re in a winners

 **David:** Ew go on

 **Stevie:** You have $100 you have to clothe your whole family

 **David:** And patrick

 **Stevie:** No you will clothe Patrick at the thrift shop we went to. Using only clothes that have been worn by multiple other ppl

 **David:** No bc I would refuse and then he’d just be naked. Back to hot

 **Stevie:** I can’t believe u would leave Patrick naked in a thrift store

 **David:** I don’t like it any more than you do  
**David:** That’s a lie  
**David:** I like it

 **Stevie:** I don’t want to hear what you find hot anymore it’s too disturbing

 **David:** That’s funny because I still think youre hot

 **Stevie:** disturbing

 **David:** Need I remind you you find disturbing hot

 **Stevie:** Let’s talk about how brewers’s giving you blue balls

 **David:** bye

 **Stevie:** You can always fuck in the woods

 **David:** bye

 **Stevie:** Or upstairs

 **David:** You know I don’t like upstairs

 **Stevie:** There would be nothing wrong with fucking upstairs

 **David:** I’m going to sleep

 **Stevie:** It’s a washing machine. That’s all.

 **David:** It moved

 **Stevie:** Bc it was washing

 **David:** It crept like a sentient object

 **Stevie:** Objects don’t have sentience

 **David:** There was something alive inside of it

 **Stevie:** Like a comforter?

 **David:** You weren’t there. You don’t know

 **Stevie:** Sex on top of washing machines is great 

**David:** You think I don’t know that 

**David:** They vibrate  
**Stevie:** They vibrate 

**Stevie:** jinx

 **David:** Did you literally just jinx me on a phone

 **Stevie:** I’m surprised you know about washing machines I thought you’d never seen one until you moved here

 **David:** I know everything it’s great to have sex on  
**David:** The hood of cars

 **Stevie:** No it’s not they’re hot if they were just running and they smell and you can get greasy

 **David:** hot

 **Stevie:** There’s no way you find grease hot

 **David:** Need I remind you about jake

 **Stevie:** He’s not that greasy

 **David:** xavier

 **Stevie:** Ooooooh wait that auto mechanic you did tell me about that. Didn’t you do his sister too

 **David:** No his sister in law. With him though it was at the same time.

 **Stevie:** Wow so classy

 _I love you_ , David thought again, that strange feeling that had welled inside him a few days ago, and he didn’t know why. She should feel less important, he thought, now that he had Patrick. Wasn’t that how it was supposed to go? It wasn’t _nice_ , but that was what had happened to David before. He got obsessed with someone; he forgot everyone else. It wasn’t love; it wasn’t real, but it was the kind of thing that books and movies talked about, the way that nothing else seemed to matter, but Stevie mattered. She mattered so, so much, and David wanted to tell her that, only he didn’t know how. They didn’t say things like that. They never said things like that.

 **David:** I’ve never told anyone that. About Xavier. And the sister

 **Stevie:** What about patrick

 **David:** No only you

 **Stevie:** Oh so I get the dirt what else actually do you have to offer

 **David:** Wit stunning good looks fashion humor taste I can suck like a hoover

 **Stevie:** I’d say more like a roomba

 **David:** That simile does not apply  
**David:** Also you didn’t contradict the rest

 **Stevie:** Its ok David you can give me all ur dirt I will be your garbage compactor

 **David:** Thank you

 **Stevie:** Go to sleep

Ooh, she didn’t like that, being thanked. David smiled to himself in his bed, looking at the texts in the glowing light of his phone.

 **David:** You’re so good to me

 **Stevie:** whatever

 **David:** I value you

 **Stevie:** I hate you 

**David:** I wouldn’t have made it through this night without you

 **Stevie:** I’m putting my phone on silent

 **David:** How can I ever convey my gratitude  
**David:** For killing my erection?  
**David:** Do you promise to wilt my hardon any time I call?  
**David:** Never mind  
**David:** I know you will  
**David:** Why?  
**David:** Because I value you

 **David:** Also you’re just really good at killing erections did you go to school for that

*

**Sex w David**

Originally David had taken off Wednesday to go to his appointment and shop for a perfectly sized box that made a nice sound when you closed it and had strong hinges so that it would last and was unassuming but beautiful, the sort of thing you could leave on a bureau but _wouldn't_ because it was also special. But now David had a growing list that included buying blank CDs, finding sleeves for these CDs, finding a place to burn CDs because who even used that technology anymore, shopping for a bullet journal, and pens for a bullet journal, and washi tape for a bullet journal—never mind, nowhere in Elmdale was going to have washi tape that was not offensive. Nowhere in Elmdale was going to have washi tape. Who was he kidding? Everything here was offensive. 

Patrick should have a gold paint pen. Patrick would never use a gold paint pen. Patrick would look at a gold paint pen and laugh and mock David for getting him a gold paint pen. The thought made David want to get Patrick a gold paint pen even more. The CD sleeves should have a button and string closure. That was the only way they wouldn’t be hideous, even though they were CD sleeves. They should be that _natural brown_ color, with that slightly rough, fibrous feel to them, as though they were recycled, but maybe not actually recycled because recycled paper smelled. The only way to write on such a sleeve was an india ink brush pen, or possibly a fountain pen; David used to have those Kuretake Sumi brush pens; they were only like twenty dollars apiece; it could be worth it to get a set; this was dumb; twenty dollars was his fragrance budget for a month. Who could buy cologne for twenty dollars? No one. Why was everything so terrible?

David was going to have to _budget_ , which meant that he should have brought Patrick, but Patrick was working and shouldn’t come anyway, since it was all for him. Which was a reminder, David needed to sample the sandwich place he had heard was out in the middle of nowhere on Loon Lake Road. Roland had been singing the praises of its Reubens, but that didn’t mean anything; it could still be good. But was it good _enough_? So many Reubens had inferior rye. And soggy coleslaw. And weak sauce. And weak swiss. And corned beef that didn’t melt in your mouth; you could tell a sandwich shop by its Rueben, and David wanted a perfect sandwich shop. It needed to be perfect.

 **Patrick:** It’s slow today

 **David:** Is this a subtle hint I could be there making out with you

 **Patrick:** That’s not on the calendar

David remembered what was on the calendar.

 **David:** Did the calendar say a time? Bc I don’t remember

 **Patrick:** Why don’t you check your bujo

 **David:** Do you really want me showing up late for this important appointment?

 **Patrick:** 7.00  
**Patrick:** Better make it 7.10  
**Patrick:** Go ahead and eat before you come

 **David:** What if I don’t want to 

**Patrick:** I mean fine whatever you want but that’s less sex for you

 **David:** How many are you planning on having  
**David:** Bc last time you started without me and I can assure you that’s not necessary

 **Patrick:** I would’ve lost it the moment I touched you

 **David:** hot

 **Patrick:** inconvenient

 **David:** hot

 **Patrick:** messy

 **David:** hot

 **Patrick:** Anyway the games at 7.00 ray should really be out by 6.45. But he’ll want to stick around if you show up before he leaves

 **David:** Not hot

 **Patrick:** For once you are correct

 **David:** I’m always correct about what’s hot

 **Patrick:** nah

 **David:** I am

 **Patrick:** Anyway ray doesn’t want anyone having fun without him.

 **David:** Is he aware of the kind of fun we intend to have

 **Patrick:** Pretty sure it wouldn’t cross his mind

 **David:** Have you thought about showing him the calendar

 **Patrick:** I’ve thought of *several* scenarios in which I attempt to explain sex to Ray. Would you like the honor

 **David:** NO  
**David:** I bow to your better judgment  
**David:** Except about hot things I’ve never been wrong about hot things

 **Patrick:** Yes you have

 **David:** Name one

David waited for the answer in the lobby of a clinic, but then the tech person called his name. David slid his phone into his pocket and followed her into the back. He checked again when they were drawing his blood and he couldn’t very well reply.

 **Patrick:** Your thighs  
**Patrick:** Your eyes  
**Patrick:** Your smile  
**Patrick:** The way you say hello

“Sorry, am I hurting you?” said the nurse, an unassuming man who looked to be in his fifties. He had long dark hair with a streak of gray, held back in a ponytail, and his hand was resting on David’s forearm as he drew out the blood.

“No,” David said, putting away his phone and dashing at his eyes. “I just—it’s sort of dusty in here.”

The nurse hummed soothingly, as though he didn’t believe him. “Okay,” he said, setting aside a vial of blood. “Just one more.”

David focused on the needle in his arm.

*

Coming to Ray’s later was better in the long run. David could shower and clean thoroughly, eat something light, and make sure his breath was fresh and that he smelled great—the works, really. Well, not all the works. If Patrick had been another boyfriend maybe he would’ve gotten the works. Somehow David couldn’t imagine showing up for Patrick lubed and prepped and plugged, though. Okay, David could _imagine_ it, but he wasn’t going to do it. 

He could, though. Ray was supposed to be gone. No one but Patrick in the house. No one but Patrick, waiting for _Sex w David_. These were the thought that filled David’s mind when he knocked on Ray’s door. When the door swung open almost instantly to reveal a harried-looking Patrick, David thought that these might be Patrick’s thoughts too. This was Patrick’s _desperate to get laid_ face, David thought, stepping over the threshold. “Eager, are we?”

“David,” Patrick said, stepping back.

“Hello, David!” said a voice that actually _was_ eager, and David froze right where he stood.

“Um,” said David. “Ray.” Then he couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“Ray was just leaving,” Patrick explained, but he closed the door behind David, which meant Ray wasn’t leaving _right this second_ , unfortunately.

“I’m going to play poker with Ronnie and Roland,” said Ray.

“Oh,” David said faintly, glancing at Patrick.

The harried look had dropped off of Patrick’s face, and now he just seemed amused—a little chagrined, perhaps, but mostly amused, helplessly amused, as if watching David contend with Ray was some kind of private show that had been engineered for Patrick’s personal amusement. Maybe it had. You never knew with Patrick; he was a tease. David didn’t like him at all, and Patrick still had on his silly little work uniform—the button-down, the jeans, the belt—but he didn’t have on shoes. This was what Patrick did in the evenings; he undid one more button so his whole throat could look like a glass of water, and he walked around in those cute bare feet. How scandalous.

“I didn’t know you were coming,” Ray went on. “Patrick didn’t tell me. But he obviously told you! You’re welcome any time, of course. It’s Patrick’s room. And my house! Can I take your bag?”

“Um,” said David, clutching his bag.

“I’ll take it,” said Patrick, seeming even more amused.

David felt some reluctance, but then Patrick was there, his hand on the strap of the satchel, easing it off David’s shoulder, and David had visions of protestations that ended with lube spilling all over the floor like crime scene evidence, so he let Patrick take it.

“You can make yourself at home,” Ray said, gesturing as Patrick disappeared somewhere with David’s bag. “Would you like something to drink?”

“Um,” David said again.

“Water? Milk? Orange juice? Big Up? Ginger Ale? Labatts? Reisling? Pinot Noir?”

“Vodka,” said David.

“I don’t have that,” Ray said, sounding delighted about it.

“Weren’t you going somewhere?” David asked.

“I have tequila,” Ray went on.

“Yes,” David agreed. “That.” 

“Okay!” Turning, Ray bustled over to the kitchen. 

David followed him because the world was a terrible place. “Do you have grenadine?”

“Yes!” said Ray. “Tequila sunrise is my seventh favorite drink!”

For some reason Ray had this whole—cocktail bar. David didn’t understand why he hadn’t known that Ray had a cocktail bar, except he’d only been here one other time, and he’d gotten pretty tipsy then, so maybe he had just missed it. And Ray was rambling on about cocktails—piña coladas, cosmos, daiquiris. “How can you not have vodka?” David asked, because it didn’t make sense, considering the setup.

“Usually I do,” Ray said, “but Patrick finished it all when Bob and Gwen were here. We had white Russians.”

“With stromboli?”

“Gwen made a coffee cake. It’s her specialty. There might be some at the game tonight, because it’s at Bob and Gwen’s, and Gwen makes all of the hors d’oeuvres. They’re delicious! What’s your favorite hors d’oeuvres? Mine is spinach and artichoke. But sometimes chile con queso.”

David tried to drown himself in a tequila sunrise, which he had to admit was in fact delicious.

When Patrick returned, he looked surprised to find them in the kitchen, and David felt a little guilty—he didn’t know why. Patrick was coming over to him, hand sliding across David’s waist to the small of his back. “You were supposed to be getting rid of him,” Patrick murmured.

“How?” David whispered back.

“Well, for one thing, don’t let him play host.”

“Patrick, do you want a tequila sunrise?” asked Ray.

“I’ll have some of David’s,” Patrick said, and David instinctively moved his drink away from Patrick, because that had not been agreed upon. “Isn’t the game starting soon?” Patrick asked.

“David asked about my cocktails!” Ray said, and Patrick’s hand slid along David’s back again to pinch David’s hip—not very nicely, and David jumped.

If it was meant as a punishment, it had kind of the opposite effect, though perhaps Patrick meant it as a promise of things to come. In that case, Ray needed to leave. Right now. 

That took some doing, and at one point during the whole process, Patrick actually did take David’s drink away. When David tried to reach for it back, Patrick murmured, “If you finish it when he’s around, he’s going to stay and make you another. It’s ‘if you give a mouse a cookie’.”

“Patrick,” said Ray, smiling his big smile. “I can make you your own drink!”

“No!” yelped David. “We like sharing!”

“That’s so romantic,” said Ray, who looked charmed. “It’s so nice you’re getting time to hang out tonight!”

“Isn’t it just,” Patrick said, then knocked back some of that tequila sunrise.

“Yes!” said Ray.

“’Hang out,’” David repeated weakly, because even though Ray was here David had not forgotten what he was here for. _Sex w David._ Patrick looked really good drinking tequila.

Finally, Ray was actually leaving—opening the door, stepping out, closing the door leaving, and David, definitely hearing Ray outside, reached for Patrick’s hand, which was loose around the glass on Ray’s counter.

“I wouldn’t,” Patrick said, and David froze. “There’s about a sixty-five percent chance he’s going to come back because he forgot something, and then be very curious about the kind of fun we’re having without him.”

“Then I deserve this,” David said, plucking the glass out of Patrick’s hand.

Patrick looked like he was trying not to smile, but his face broke into it anyway. “Sorry. I really thought I could get him to leave before you got here.”

“If I finish it and he comes back, is he going to try to make me another?” David asked.

“Are you asking that because you want another?”

“That depends,” said David. “How long do we have to stand in the kitchen?”

“Why?” Patrick just looked so fucking amused. “Is there somewhere you have to be?”

David raised his brows. “I have a previous commitment.”

“Oh, you do?” Patrick came closer, his hands slipping along David’s hips again, moving closer, brushing his nose along David’s jaw and taking a deep breath of him.

“Yes,” David breathed. “What if he comes back?”

“And sees how much fun we’re having?” Patrick nipped along David’s jaw.

“Uh-huh,” said David, kind of gasping, because he had been looking forward to this—to the appointment on the calendar, the time alone, Wednesday night, Patrick’s ridiculous room, but now it was almost real. They were almost there. He could almost touch Patrick the way he wanted, without worrying they would be interrupted; Patrick could almost touch him. After Eddie Q’s and the failed trip to the Cookie Mill, Patrick had taken David back to the motel parking lot and kissed him in his car, but it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough. 

“You’re right,” Patrick said, pulling away suddenly. He smiled. “I wouldn’t want Ray to think we’re having any fun at all.” Picking up the forgotten glass from the counter where David must have placed it while Patrick was _nuzzling_ at him, Patrick swigged the rest of the tequila sunrise, set down the glass, then opened the refrigerator.

“What are you doing?” David finally found the voice to ask.

Patrick glance at him in surprise, the carton of orange juice in his hand. “I thought you wanted another drink.”

“I don’t want another one. I want—other things.”

Patrick had been smiling, but now as he looked at David the smile faded. Putting the cap back on the orange juice, he put it back in the refrigerator. 

“How much,” David began, and had to start again; his voice was scratchy. “How much longer do we have to wait?”

“Two minutes.” The corner of Patrick’s mouth twisted into an ironic little smile. “Gonna make it?”

“I have experience with delayed gratification.” David tried not to sway. Stevie read all kinds of things into him when he swayed. 

“Sure, you do,” Patrick said, sounding like doubt. 

“I do,” David insisted, and meanwhile Patrick was standing over there on the other side of the kitchen, hovering by the refrigerator as though it might protect him. Now was David turn to grow suspicious. “Are _you_ going to make it?” David asked.

“No,” Patrick said, then was striding over to him, grabbing David’s hand, dragging him out of the kitchen.

“Are you sure?” David said, hurrying behind him. “What if Ray comes—”

“If I get you up there fast enough and against the door,” said Patrick, already at the stairs and starting up them, “what can he really do?”

“Oh, against a _door_.” David laughed, following him upstairs. “What are you going to do to me against a—”

“I’ll show you,” Patrick said, jerking open the door, pushing David inside, coming in, closing it, moving around David, pushing him against it.

“Oh,” David breathed; then Patrick was kissing him, and it wasn’t nearly enough. David wanted to get slammed into the door; he wanted it to hurt; he wanted to get fucked; he wanted to get used so hard he couldn’t think, couldn’t think, couldn’t think, couldn’t want Patrick anymore. David wanted everything external to him to match this need ratcheting higher and higher and higher, pressing on the insides of his skin and skull, so he kissed back.

He kissed back a lot. He put his tongue in Patrick’s mouth, and usually Patrick did that to him except that this time, David wouldn’t let him, and Patrick made this high, tight, surprised little sound and thrust his tongue forcefully against David’s. 

Usually David let Patrick in his mouth, because he wanted Patrick to get to do whatever he wanted, but David _wanted_ him. He wanted him, so David kept pushing his tongue in and put his knee between Patrick’s thighs, and Patrick made another little sound, pulling away from him, breathing too heavily. Then he was coming back and biting David’s lower lip, biting hard enough to hurt and make David’s mouth fall open in surprise, and the Patrick’s tongue was there, in execution of a very dirty trick, and it was so hot. It was so hot.

David’s hands slid down, finding space between them, pushing into that space as he slid his hands back up between them, up Patrick’s chest, pushing Patrick away. Hard.

“David?” Patrick breathed, and David grabbed Patrick by the lapels of his dress shirt, turned him around, slammed him against the door, much more roughly than was polite. Patrick made a shocked sound, and David covered it with his mouth, all of his mouth; David didn’t want to be nice. He wanted to put his tongue down Patrick’s throat, so he did it.

Patrick’s hands scrambled on David’s back, Patrick’s own back arching against the door, Patrick’s knee rising up and jamming into David’s thigh. Then Patrick bit him again—bit David’s tongue, and David released him, because Patrick was struggling—

“Come on,” Patrick panted, then pushed him, hard, and David was stumbling back, almost saying that he was sorry, until he realized Patrick hadn’t said no and was still pushing him. “Come on.” Patrick pushed him until David fell on the bed. “David,” Patrick said, starting to climb over him, and fuck, Patrick _wanted_ this. He wanted David like this, and David wanted it too. 

David needed it; he was tired of slow and fifties boyfriends and having nowhere to go when all he wanted was cock. David just wanted cock; he wanted _Patrick’s_ cock; David had been waiting. He’d been waiting since Saturday morning; that was almost five days, five days without it, without it in his hands, without it in his mouth, without it on him, coming on him.

Grabbing Patrick by the shoulders, David pulled Patrick off and pushed him down on the bed, getting on top of him, hands going straight for Patrick’s jeans. “Yeah,” Patrick said, sounding so needy, even as he struggled, as he tried to push his way back on top; he wanted it. Patrick still wanted it, and David didn’t understand why he hadn’t he known Patrick had wanted it this way. Was it because they were supposed to be going slow? Was this slow? Was this slow enough? They had not turned on the lights when they had come in, and David couldn’t see Patrick well enough to find out. 

“David,” Patrick rasped, arching under David, yanking on his hair. David cried out a little and his hair was immediately released, but it was the distraction Patrick needed, because now he had his hand on David’s shoulder, Patrick’s leg hooking up, pushing David off so Patrick was on top again, breathing too hard. “I need,” Patrick panted. “God, I need—” he said, but he didn’t finish.

David kissed with teeth, and Patrick’s hair was too short to pull but David did it anyway, as much as he could, and Patrick made another tight, surprised sound, but it sounded like pleasure too. When David tried to get on top again Patrick resisted—like _really_ resisted, but he kept saying, “Yeah, come on, come on, I want you to; I _want_ you to,” as David finally wrestled him down, got on top of him. Patrick’s hips thrust uncontrollably against David’s. “Do it,” Patrick muttered, thrusting up again.

David jerked on Patrick’s jeans, scrambled over Patrick’s underwear, got his hand in—Patrick was already breathing hard, his cock stiff, dripping wet. Mouth watering at just the scent of it, David held onto Patrick’s cock and moved down Patrick’s body, until finally, he could got his mouth on it.

“Ffff—” Patrick said, but he didn’t finish, hips jerking, hands burying themselves in David’s hair, just like David had shown him.

David liked the feel of cock, hot and heavy of his tongue; he liked the flavor of it, sharp and salty like sex; he liked this. He was good at this. He _missed_ this, oral sex, and there were aspects of his past he was not proud of, but he wasn’t ashamed of the sex itself. Sex was good. Sex was fantastic, and he wanted to take it. He wanted to take it right now, like it was his, and apparently Patrick liked it that way, so David came off Patrick’s cock, grabbing Patrick’s wrists, pinning them together and holding them down on Patrick’s abs.

Patrick actually said it that time, “Fuck,” his hips jerking as David forced his hands down.

“I know,” David said, bending his head again, but instead of putting his mouth on it he smelled it, that sharp, thick scent of arousal. Then he put his mouth under it, under Patrick’s cock, licking Patrick’s sac, letting go of Patrick’s wrists finally to get his hand under Patrick’s balls and lift them up, feeding them into his mouth, holding them so he could get as much as he could in.

Patrick made this sad, tight little sound, a wounded sound. Then his hands were in David’s hair again, yanking up, and David was thinking, _surely you’ve teabagged before,_ but maybe Patrick hadn’t, because as soon as he yanked up on David’s hair—not very successfully—he was pushing David’s head in again, as though guiding it to suck. Then one of Patrick’s hands let him go, wrapping around the base of his own cock and beginning a rapid stroke while David still had his mouth full of Patrick’s balls, and David finally pulled his mouth off.

“Uh-uh,” he said, taking Patrick’s hand away. “It’s mine. Let me.” Then David was dipping his head back over Patrick’s cock, sucking the wetness at the head.

“Oh,” Patrick said, brokenly. “I—I—can’t.”

 _Oh,_ David’s thoughts echoed. 

Patrick was coming.

It was a surprise; it was a nice surprise, so soon, but maybe Patrick didn’t think so; he was trying to pull himself away, poor sweetheart. David’s hands scrambled on Patrick’s hips so he could get it; he needed it, and David wanted to tell him he was good; this was what David had wanted. This was what David needed, Patrick making these helpless, whimpering sounds.

 _You’re so hot,_ David thought at him, looking up at him, hoping Patrick could somehow feel it from him. _You’re so, so hot; I want your come; I’ll make you come again. I’ll do you again, sweetheart. Sweetheart. I can give it to you again; you can get it as many times as you want. I’ll give it to you until you’re done with me._

Finally, Patrick’s hips were slowing, and David was cleaning him up, lapping at it. The hand that had been tight in David’s hair finally loosened, then went lax, and Patrick was still, breathing in long steady breaths. 

This was the best part of sex, when David got to smell it and taste it and know he’d done so well, the air in the room grown lazy and thick and warm. 

“Sorry,” Patrick breathed.

 _Don’t say you’re sorry,_ David wanted to say, but he still had come in his mouth. He didn’t want Patrick to be sorry.

Patrick was still talking. “I hadn’t planned on—”

David moved up and kissed him, come on his tongue, pressing come into Patrick’s mouth. 

Making a startled sound, Patrick jerked away, and David came to his senses.

Putting someone’s own come in their mouth didn’t mean _don’t be sorry_. It didn’t mean anything like that, and why had he thought—

Then Patrick was pushing him down and kissing him, tongue so warm and thick in David’s mouth that it was very clear that there was no come left in Patrick’s mouth. _No snowball?_ went David’s brain. Maybe Patrick didn’t know about snowballing. Seriously, what did Patrick know? David wished wished wished he hadn’t been so distracted that he had missed Patrick swallowing his own come. Dammit. That was something David really wished he could have seen.

Patrick began to smile against his mouth, which was an entirely different reaction than _sorry_. David felt quite proud of this. “What?” Patrick breathed.

“What do you mean, ‘what?'” David was sort of worried come had splashed in his eyebrows or something. Would Patrick see it in the dark? David swiped his hand over his face, just to be sure.

“You were smiling,” Patrick said.

“ _You_ were smiling.”

“Because you were.” Patrick’s brushed his nose against David’s, as though he just needed his face up against David’s even when they weren’t kissing. “Did you think I was gonna freak out because you snowballed me?”

Now Patrick was trying to kiss him again, but David had to pull away, because accuracy was important. “Okay, it’s not _snowballing_ if you only pass it once.”

“You wanted me to give it back to you?” 

David couldn’t interpret Patrick’s voice without seeing his expression clearly. Disgusted? Intrigued? “That’s why it’s called snowballing,” was all David said.

Patrick breathed laughter against David’s cheek. “Okay,” he said, trailing kisses along David’s jaw. “I’ll do it next time.”

“Oooh,” David said, but he was really only half teasing. “ _Next_ time.”

Patrick kissed him softly for another languid minute, so lazy and hot that David could forget about how hard he was. It felt good, being hard and warm and kissed by Patrick in the dark, both of them almost entirely clothed still in Patrick’s bed. At last, Patrick’s fingers found the drawstring of David’s sweats, where they tangled themselves, then tugged, rather insistently.

“Mmm, is it ‘next time’ already?”

“No,” said Patrick, letting go the drawstring and getting off the bed. Unbuttoning his shirt as he walked, he went and turned on the light. “I had a different plan.”

“Mmm, a _plan_.” David wanted to stretch out on the bed, because Patrick had turned on the light so he could see him, and David wanted to look sexy for him. He wanted to stretch out and look sexy, like a—a—a _cat_ or a super model or—wait, cats weren’t sexy. Except they kind of were? Anyway, he wanted to stretch out like a sexy thing and watch Patrick undress while looking very—very inviting and sexy himself, except as soon as David was stretched, he felt ridiculous and exposed and kept wondering if it was gross to find cats sexy. 

_Do you find cats sexy?_ he wanted to ask, except he had an _excellent_ brain-to-mouth filter so he did not say this, instead unstretching again and sitting up and crossing his legs sort of awkwardly. He should open his legs so Patrick could see he was half-hard. No one was going to see anything in these sweats anyway, which was a good thing. David looked more fantastic the less you saw. “What’s the plan?” he asked loudly, as Patrick got his shirt off and tossed it carelessly on the floor. 

Patrick had a white tank on under it, and he came over to the bed, taking out his phone and reaching across David to put it on the bedside table, then reaching for David’s sweatshirt. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” Patrick said, tugging up on it.

“I would, which is why I asked,” David said, wondering whether he was going to help Patrick take his sweatshirt off. David didn’t particularly want it off, but he _did_ like plans, apparently. He didn’t know. He wasn’t sure he’d really had someone plan out sex with him before-hand, but the current state of his arousal suggested he was into it, though he supposed the blowjob and snowballing had something to do with it. “What makes you think I’ll do your plans?” David asked, raising his arms for Patrick to take off the sweatshirt the rest of the way. He was helping, he guessed.

“Why wouldn’t you?” Patrick said, sounding amused, per usual. “Because you’re unpredictable?”

“I _am_ unpredictable,” David said, right when Patrick was pulling the sweatshirt over his head, so the words were kind of muffled.

“Yeah,” Patrick agreed, tossing the sweatshirt away. “I like it.” Patrick’s hand almost instantly came to touch David’s collarbone, sweeping lower into chest hair.

David’s eyes followed the sweatshirt. “That’s Burberry.”

“Is that supposed to mean something to me?” Patrick asked, still stroking David’s chest and he leaned in to kiss him.

David pulled away. “You shouldn’t throw it on the floor.”

“You’ve never cared before.”

“I’m unpredictable,” said David.

Patrick tried to kiss him again, but David was distracted by the Burberry sweatshirt on the floor. “Really?” Patrick said, but he was smiling, already moving away, picking up the sweatshirt, folding it and putting it on the credenza next to the little birdie vase.

David still had his shoes on, so while Patrick was doing that, David began taking them off. “And I imagine these are special high tops?” Patrick said, taking the one David had already removed and putting his hand out for the other as David was taking it off. “Are they allowed to go on the floor?”

“They’re shoes,” said David.

“Mm-hm,” Patrick agreed, but he took them over to the credenza and put them carefully at the base of it, as though the shoes were special, which they were. Rick Owens. David took his socks off.

“And these,” Patrick said, coming back to the bed, his knee back on it, hands reaching for David’s drawstring again. “These are very high-end sweats?”

“Do they _look_ cheap?” David said, feeling a little offended with all the teasing.

“Oh, of course not, no way,” Patrick said, untying the knot.

“They’re Missoni,” David said, lying back when Patrick pushed him. Patrick started pulling off the sweats as well, then got them down David’s legs, off his ankles, and proceeded to fold those up too, putting them on top of the sweatshirt on the credenza. David wished Patrick would put the sweatshirt on top of the pants; these things had an order, but then Patrick was coming back and David was in just black underwear. 

Patrick got a knee on the bed, reaching for the underwear too, when David said, “Can this come off too?” He plucked at Patrick’s tank top.

“I don’t know, David,” Patrick said, pushing David down again, manhandling him so he could get David’s underwear off. “I want to get you naked? So I’m not really thinking about my clothes right now.”

Patrick’s tone was amused, almost like it was a private joke that David was failing to comprehend, but he let Patrick do it to him, remove his underwear so he was naked. Patrick was basically fully clothed, except even though his jeans were up, they were still open, and with that white tank top he looked—well. Well. Patrick had a sweet face and soft eyes but he sort of looked like he could fuck shit up. _Is this the plan?_ David wanted to ask, but by now he was feeling kind of too anxious about it to ask, and Patrick was folding the underwear like you shouldn’t do with that underwear. “And this is designer too, I’ll bet? A hundred dollar underwear?”

David’s underwear used to cost more than a hundred dollars, almost three times as much, really, except you could only make even dozens of pairs last so long, and recently he had had to buy sad things online that were twenty dollars apiece. He hadn’t even gotten to feel the fabric beforehand. Maybe he should go to that outlet mall that Patrick had taken him to. He could not believe he was thinking these things, but it was probably to distract himself from the fact that he was very naked in the light, and then a very clothed Patrick was climbing on top of him, straddling his waist.

“Reach up for those bars,” Patrick said.

“Wh-what?” David asked, because Patrick’s jean-clad ass was sitting on David’s hips, and David’s cock was erect enough to touch it; Patrick had to know.

“These,” Patrick said, taking David’s hand, guiding it above David’s head. Patrick had a bedframe of brass, a headboard consisting of bars—sturdier than Stevie’s, but open like hers, with places to hold. “Can you hold on?” Patrick’s lips were right by David’s ear, soft but excited; Patrick was excited by the idea of David holding on. “Don’t let go until I say?”

“Um, yes.” David’s hand tightened on the bar, and then he actually thought about it. “Yes. Yep. I can—do that. I’m very good at that.”

Patrick took a swift breath. “Yeah,” he breathed, amused, but still so eager, and then Patrick was kissing him, not pushing his ass back enough for David to get the friction on his cock he really needed but whatever; bars were good. Bars were great. He had no idea what Patrick was going to do; he loved not knowing. Not knowing had gotten David into some very bad situations in the past, but it was worth it; the thrill was worth it, and this was different; wasn’t it? He wasn’t tied up, and this was Patrick, who was kissing him now, only kissing him—warm soft lips, and the gentlest of teasing tongue.

Patrick was on top of him in his tank and unbuckled belt and unfastened jeans and just kept kissing him, despite the fact that he had David laid out to his liking. When he did something different it was only running two fingers along David’s too soft too pale triceps, making him shiver. “Ticklish?” Patrick said, pulling away.

“No,” David lied quickly. “I’m not ticklish. Not at all. Anywhere.”

“Yeah?” Patrick asked, then did it against, just stroking his fingers up from just above David’s armpit up along David’s arm to the inside of his elbow, and David shivered again. “Not at all, huh?” Patrick said.

“Mm-mm.” David shook his head.

“You told me, once,” Patrick went on, “you were ticklish here.” Then he started kissing behind David’s ear, running his fingers over and over again up along David’s arm. It was kind of like torture, the kind of torture where you thought it wasn’t so bad at first, but it was the repetition that got you, because that spot at his ear was arousing but his triceps were definitely ticklish. Patrick stroking there again and then again and then again made David feel sensitive and tense all over, trying not to jerk away from that touch.

“Okay!” David said, finally jerking away after all. “Is this what you got my arms up here for? Because it doesn’t seem very productive if you ask me.”

“Oh, _productive_ ,” said Patrick, nuzzling up behind David’s ear. “You think this is unproductive?”

“Just what are you producing?”

“Knowledge of my appreciation.”

“I—I don’t know what that means,” David breathed, because Patrick was stroking his triceps _again_.

“I told you I liked your arms,” Patrick said. “I don’t think you really got it. I don’t think you got how _much_ I like your arms. David.”

David heard himself make a high, pitiful little sound, because Patrick moved his face, and now he was kissing—right above David’s armpit, kissing a line up David’s inner arm, finally moving to David’s bicep—thank you; David’s biceps were much nicer. He worked on them, every once in a while, when he remembered; he never even remembered triceps existed, but his biceps had some shape to them, a shape that Patrick was tracing with his tongue, scraping his teeth over. David heard himself make another little sound. These weren’t erogenous zones. What was Patrick doing to him? 

What Patrick was doing to him was sucking on David’s inner elbow, apparently, then stroking the hair on the top of David’s lower arm like—like he was _petting_ it. Then Patrick kissed that too, and got his teeth on it, and pulled; he was _pulling_ David’s arm hair with his _teeth_ , and David yelped, because ow—also gross. Weird. What if Patrick was freaky? What if Patrick was actually freaky and here David had thought Patrick was kind of sexually vanilla, but what if—

“You can let this one go,” Patrick said, tugging on David’s hand. Patrick had made it all the way there, kissing and licking and _nuzzling_ and biting and _pulling David’s arm hair_. Kind of warily, David uncurled his fingers from around the bar of the bed frame, giving his hand to Patrick, who held the back of David’s hand against his palm and brought it up to begin sucking on David’s inner wrist, fingers interlacing with David’s from behind.

“Oh,” David said, hips jerking helplessly on the bed. He wasn’t even sure if it was the wrist-sucking or the fucking _hand-holding_ ; who went around sucking people’s inner wrists? Freaks, that was who.

“You like that?” Patrick asked.

“Um,” said David. The skin there was just very thin; that was all.

Patrick bit down on it, not nearly hard enough. 

“ _Oh_ ,” David said again, half a shout, hips going at it again, cock jumping. “Yes! I like it! I like it!” David wasn’t sure whether he was shouting so that Patrick would keep going or stop, but Patrick stopped, teeth letting go, tongue soothing over where he had bitten. It wasn’t enough to leave a mark, but it made David remember his other mark, almost faded now. He wished he could touch it, but Patrick was holding one of David’s hands and hadn’t told him he could move the other one. Patrick had a plan, and David wanted Patrick to have a plan; he wanted Patrick to get to do his plan. David wanted Patrick to have everything, so David kept his other hand up, white-knuckling the brass bar as Patrick licked and sucked David’s other wrist.

“I like your hands, too,” Patrick said, finally lifting his mouth from David’s wrist and putting his tongue in the center of David’s palm. David flinched away, but only because it was weird and unexpected. “I told you that before. And your rings. Do you remember that?”

“No,” David said. “I mean, I probably wasn’t listening. You should tell me again, in detail, so I—” 

“You want details?” Patrick had turned over David’s hand and brought it closer, closer to his mouth, David’s fingertips near his lips, and Patrick’s gaze pinned David over them, Patrick’s brown eyes so hot and steady.

David’s breath caught. “Yes,” he said, voice tremulous and shaking, and then Patrick was opening his mouth, closing his eyes, taking David’s fingers down. David’s heart was in his throat for some reason, and Patrick’s lips were covering his teeth like proper blow-job etiquette, and David couldn’t watch. His hips thrust mindlessly, his dick against Patrick; no one had never done anything so intimate to David before, and yet lots of people had sucked his fingers, lots and lot, but not someone like Patrick. Someone who _looked_ at David like that, someone who said it was because he was beautiful, someone who said they liked his hands, someone who had never sucked a dick before.

“Patrick,” David breathed, because he needed more, or maybe he needed less; he needed _something_.

“Mmph,” said Patrick, who tightened his grip on David’s wrist and took David’s fingers down farther. He shouldn’t do that. He was going to make himself gag. 

Patrick didn’t gag, as if knowing exactly where his limit was, his tongue on David’s rings, and then he pulled off halfway, tongue stroking David’s fingers, pushing between them, and that—oh that . . . David didn’t understand why, but the soft muscle of Patrick’s tongue thrusting between his fingers as Patrick slowly fucked them in and out of his mouth was making David crazy. It was making David crazy, those soft sounds of sucking; everywhere else was loud—the motel, Stevie’s the store. You could hear distant road sounds there, but here in Ray’s quiet country home there was just the wet sound of Patrick’s tongue, the soft low moan he made when David hips thrust again, involuntarily.

David wanted to fuck. He wanted to fuck his fingers into Patrick’s mouth. He wanted to fuck his cock into Patrick’s body. He wanted to fuck _something_ , and this was kind of like torture, being inside Patrick for the first time but not getting nearly enough.

David heard his own needy whine, and Patrick at last slid David’s fingers out of his mouth, the wet little sound it made causing David’s breath to catch all over again. “Here,” Patrick said, sounding equally breathless. He guided David’s hand to the hem of his tank top, where he wiped David’s fingers off, drying them carefully and then lifting David’s hand again, guiding it back to the brass bar of the headboard. David heard himself whine again; he didn’t mean to. He didn’t know what Patrick was going to _do_ to him, but Patrick knew. David wrapped his hand around the bar.

“That’s perfect,” Patrick breathed, then began kissing his way back down David’s wrist. “I’ve never done that to someone before,” Patrick said against the underside of David’s forearm, between kisses he was dragging against the paler skin there.

“Never?” David choked out, surprised.

Patrick gave a little shrug, then kept kissing. “I’ve done it to myself.”

David’s hips twitched again. “Patrick,” he said, his voice a little higher than was necessary.

“You think that’s hot,” Patrick said, still kissing down David’s arm. One of his hands was touching David’s nipple now, thumbing over it, and what a silly question, what a ridiculous _foolish_ question, as if every single part of this wasn’t the hottest thing that had ever happened.

“Um,” said David.

“You think it’s hot when I do things to myself.” Patrick lightly bit David’s triceps. 

“Mm!” David jerked again, but followed up quickly, lest Patrick misunderstand any part of this. “Yes, it’s hot; I think about you—touching yourself; I think about it and I—” _text Stevie_. 

“What do you do?” Patrick sounded breathless.

“Things.” David wasn’t sure whether talking about this was going slow. “I do . . . things, when I think about you; I . . .” He stopped because Patrick was laughing.

“Maybe you could show me sometime,” Patrick suggested, his eyes bright.

“Mm-hm.” David’s head jerked up and down to say yes without really thinking about it.

“Okay.” Patrick kept moving down David’s arm, kissing and kissing, down to David’s armpit. David flinched away.

“Don’t like that?” Patrick said, pulling away, but he replaced his mouth with his hand, very gently stroking David’s underarm, the hair there.

“Um . . .” David said, because armpits were gross. He held himself tensely, trying not to flinch again, because now Patrick was basically just tickling him. “Do you?”

“I told you. I don’t know what I like.” Patrick leaned down to kiss David’s mouth, and David finally realized what was happening. This was a fucking—voyage of discovery; Patrick was fucking Magellan and David was the Earth that Patrick would circumnavigate. “Except you,” Patrick breathed against his mouth. “I know that I like you.”

Patrick’s hand pressed warm and solid against David’s under arm, kind of just holding him there, which felt a lot less gross and just—reassuring and nice, actually. The skin there was much more tender than other parts, and David wanted to be an untouched continent; he wanted to be an entire atlas Patrick could explore. _I like you too_ , the thing in David’s chest screamed, but he didn’t know how to let it out. Years ago he’d built a cage inside himself, and this feeling was too big to fit between its bars.

Then Patrick was kissing down David’s throat, along his collarbone, over to his other shoulder, where Patrick pulled back at the bruise of the bite mark, just a faded bruise of yellow now, with only the faint red trace of teeth. Frowning, Patrick almost looked as though he was going to touch it. David braced himself for the pleasure of it, but Patrick’s fingers stopped an inch away, and his head lifted to David. “Does it hurt?”

“No,” said David, wishing they could just pretend it wasn’t there. “It’s fine.”

“It doesn’t look fine.”

“It’s mine.”

“What?”

“I don’t see how it’s your business.” David tried to angle the mark away, but he couldn’t with his arms up on the bars and he didn’t want to take his hands down; Patrick might still want to do something with him like this. “It’s my skin.”

“So you don’t think I get to have—just maybe—any _minor_ investment in your skin? Especially if I mark it up?”

“Only if you mark it up again,” David said, rather too loudly.

Patrick pulled back some more, his mouth quirking at the side, but he didn’t comment on this outburst. Instead he said, “Did you know that the human mouth is full of bacteria?”

David frowned with his whole body. “Why would you say that?”

“Because you could get infected.”

“You think I’m infected?” David’s arm came down, because Patrick thinking he was _diseased_ required gesticulation. Patrick definitely noticed, eyes tracking David’s hand, but Patrick didn’t say anything about it.

“No.” Patrick’s eyes met his again. “It would be redder if it was infected.”

“Oh, so you’re an expert now?”

“Not an expert. I read about it.”

“Is this what you do on your days off? Take pictures of doors and read about infections?”

The twist at the side of Patrick’s mouth was back, and it was nominally a smile but there was something weirdly ironic about it that made him seem somehow distant, just a little bit remote. “You seemed like you were into biting. So I read about it.”

“You _read_ about—about _biting_?”

Patrick just gave him this little shrug.

“You read about infections and not—why didn’t you read porn?”

“See, I didn’t think porn was going to present a very realistic representation of how to screw you silly without actually inflicting physical harm. That’s something I have an interest in.”

David stared at him, his chest gone tight, the thing inside pressing against its cage. “You read about how to—screw me silly?”

“David. I read about everything.”

“Everything?”

“Everything.”

“Armpits?”

“Armpits.”

Slowly, David raised his arm up, wrapping his hand around the brass bar again. Patrick followed the movement again with those big, brown eyes, but he was just tracking it, not saying anything. “Does this mean you won’t bite me?” David asked. “Because I might get infected?”

Patrick smiled again, and it seemed warmer somehow than before, as though some kind of danger had passed. “No, I will,” he murmured. “As much as you want.”

“I want,” David said immediately.

The smile deepened, but Patrick ducked his head, kissing the triceps on David’s other arm, as though worried it might suffer envy from the amount of attention lavished on the other arm. “I never said I’d do it _when_ you wanted.”

“Then how can you do it as ‘much as I want?’” David asked, somewhat indignant.

“I’ll count.”

“How about _where_ I want it?”

“Sure.”

“Right over the old one,” David said, this answer also immediate. “Before it fades, so I can have it for longer. And when that one fades on the same spot again. And again.”

“And again after that?” Patrick nuzzled up to David’s inner elbow. “Because this is beginning to sound like a multi-week biting project, and you only budgeted me for three weeks of your time.”

“I didn’t _budget_ you,” David said, hurt by this.

“No.” Patrick released the skin of David’s inner elbow, which he had just begun to suck. “I’m supposed to let things ‘flow’.”

“There’s nothing wrong with flow. If you didn’t try to control everything, you wouldn’t have to be crushed by mismanaged expectation.”

“I don’t try to control everything.”

David was going to respond, but Patrick finally left off the arms, mouth and hands on David’s chest now, tweaking and pinching David’s nipples, sucking on them. Patrick had explored this territory before, which was unfortunate, because he knew exactly what to do. David’s cock had softened a bit while Patrick talked too much about armpits and infection, but now it was occurring to David that he _liked_ freaks. There had been that clown; David was so into it, and Patrick was doing things with his fingernails around the areole of David’s nipple, but his mouth was just skimming over David’s pecs, as though he could not get enough of the shape, the hair, the skin.

Then finally Patrick was going lower, which—good, yes, that was where David wanted him to go, except he realized again how unclothed he was and Patrick still had _jeans_ on, and what was Patrick going to do when he got to David’s cock? Put his mouth on it? Were they there yet? Was that slow? David couldn’t ask for it; he didn’t want to ask for it; Patrick’s mouth was on David’s belly now and—it sort of tickled, actually—and, and now Patrick’s face was close to David’s cock. Patrick just had to move down a little more and it would be brushing David’s cock, except instead Patrick put his tongue in David’s navel. David jumped, making an embarrassing little sound.

“You like that?” Patrick asked, lifting his head.

“No,” said David.

Patrick glanced down at David’s abdomen skeptically, as though he thought it might tell him the truth, but David’s cock was _right there_ , and David was a little worried about Patrick seeming interested in his navel instead. “Are you sure?” Patrick asked.

“Um,” said David.

A fond little smile quirked the side of Patrick’s mouth. “Gonna need a little clarification, David.”

“I—don’t know,” David said, distracted, because now Patrick’s hand was kind of— _stroking_ David’s navel; Patrick’s arm could brush David’s cock if only he moved it a little more, except Patrick almost seemed like he was being careful not to touch it, possibly just to torture him.

“Why wouldn’t you know?” Patrick scraped his fingernail on David’s belly button, which wasn’t much of a scratch, really, because Patrick’s nails were extremely sad affairs, clipped terribly short. David shivered anyway. “Haven’t you done this, ‘like a thousand times’?”

David didn’t know what Patrick was quoting, but it _sounded_ like a quote. “I just—it’s a belly button. It’s not a sex thing,” David said breathlessly, because even though his navel _wasn’t_ an erogenous zone, it could be. It depended on what you did with it, and Patrick sounded like he was going to _do_ things with it. 

“Oh, okay, ‘not a sex thing.’” Seeming to find this amusing, Patrick stopped touching, and if he had moved straight down he would have had to deal with the arc of David’s cock, but of course Patrick didn’t do that, moving instead to David’s hip, where he put his mouth, then bit down.

“Mm!” David said, thrusting kind of helplessly, his cock brushing Patrick’s shoulder, his neck. 

“David,” Patrick said, sounding surprised, but also kind of eager. “Is this a sex thing? Did I find a sex thing?”

“I don’t know what you mean by that,” David said, really hoping that Patrick wasn’t going to find out what his hips were like and desperately, desperately hoping that Patrick was going to find out what his hips were like.

Patrick found out what David’s hips were like, putting his mouth back on the soft flesh over the hard jut of David’s hipbone, and David moaned, arching into it. He didn’t know why he was like this, why his hips and inner wrists and that spot behind his ear made him crazy; it was like, if you found the right spots on him, you could play him like a fiddle. Who even played the fiddle? Were fiddles even a thing? _Patrick_ probably played the fiddle; Patrick was _musical_ , and he was playing him now, sucking at David’s hip despite that fact that David’s cock was _right there_ , and David was writhing under him while Patrick held him down.

David wanted to thrust again, even for just that little brush of Patrick’s shirt touching his cock; he needed something touching it. Patrick hadn’t even _looked_ at it; it was torture. “Patrick,” David heard himself whine.

Patrick kept sucking.

“Patrick.” David couldn’t help himself. His arm came down to move Patrick’s head just—just a few inches to the left; then it would be on his cock, except he didn’t want Patrick on his cock because his _hip_ ; who sucked people’s hips? David’s hand hovered over Patrick’s red-brown hair, so heart-achingly short atop Patrick’s head, bent to suck determinedly at David’s hip.

Patrick was giving him a hickey, David realized, and he didn’t touch Patrick’s head. Instead he brought his hand back up to the bar above his head and closed his eyes so he wouldn’t have to look at Patrick, steadfast and dogged and trying so hard. Instead David concentrated on the feel of Patrick’s mouth, trying not to twist his hips to put his cock in Patrick’s face.

Then Patrick at last came off it, got off the bed, and went over toward the door. “What are you doing?” David said, hearing the panic in his voice, because he was naked and aching on the bed and people had left him like that before.

“Getting this,” Patrick said, picking up the satchel David had brought and already forgotten about. Patrick brought it over to the bed. “I want to touch you,” Patrick said. “You should pick out a lube. Unless you want me to use hand lotion.”

“Okay, I’m turned on, don’t talk about sad things.” David sat up to dig open the bag and dig through it.

“Can I ask,” Patrick said, “is everything in there lube? Because that seems like a lot of lube.”

“Not everything,” David said, a little defensively, taking out a bottle and handing it to Patrick.

“Uh-huh,” Patrick said, taking the bottle. “What else is in there?”

“Things.” David clutched his bag, which contained a change of clothes, massage oil, condoms, three kinds of lube—and a vibrator, just in case.

Patrick seemed to think David’s defensiveness was somehow amusing, his mouth folding over a soft smile. “Okay, you don’t need to tell me.” He reached out for David’s bag.

“You could have looked in it,” David pointed out. “When you brought it up here.” He handed the bag to Patrick, who could still look in it, David supposed.

“I would never do that, David,” Patrick said, taking the bag, setting it on the floor. 

“Why not?”

Gently, Patrick pushed him down. “Because it’s yours.”

“Why does that matter?” David asked, going where Patrick put him. 

“Because I respect your privacy,” Patrick said. “Put your hands up on those bars.”

David knew the answers to these questions—what the answers should be—but he liked how Patrick said them, not as though he was trying to convince him, but as though such answers were so ingrained inside himself Patrick wasn’t even thinking. Patrick was putting lube into the palm of his hand. “Why do you respect my privacy?” David asked, the smile that had been threatening tugging too hard on the side of his face.

Patrick seemed to find this amusing also—what else was new; Patrick seemed to find everything David did amusing—and he looked up, a smile tracing his lips and lit up in his eyes. “Because I respect you,” Patrick said, wrapping a warm, wet hand around David’s cock, and David could not help the little thrust he gave into it, the little moan he made.

“Oh, _respect_ ,” David repeated. “Is that what this is about?”

“Yeah,” said Patrick, all the amusement gone, his voice wet and breathless. His eyes were big, gazing down at his hand on David’s cock. Unconsciously, he licked his lips, moving his hand slowly up the shaft. When he got to the wet head, he brushed the tip with the pad of his thumb, and David couldn’t help but jerk a little.

“I like respect,” said David. 

“Oh, do you?”

“Mm-hm.” David closed his eyes, tipped his head back. He couldn’t look; Patrick was going so _slow_ , and his face was so enraptured, enthralled by the sight of his own hand on David’s cock. “I like it a lot.” 

“Yeah,” Patrick agreed, moving his hand back down. “There’s a lot to respect, here.”

“Um,” David said again, because he’d always been rather medium sized.

Patrick squeezed him at the base. “Spread your legs.”

“That doesn’t _sound_ respectful,” David said, but he did it anyway. 

Once David got his legs open, Patrick was climbing between them, moving down . . . Was he going to . . . ? Patrick had said he wanted to touch it, and David couldn’t tell. If he’d thought there was any possibility of Patrick going down on it, David would have given him the flavored lube. Then Patrick was going down, past David’s cock, his mouth on David’s thigh. 

“I respect your thighs,” Patrick said, stroking David’s cock, but it was like a condolence wank; Patrick’s attention was on David’s thigh. Then the warm, wet hand stroking David’s cock moved down, as though just to get David’s junk out of the way, so Patrick could suck David’s inner thigh.

Fuck. Patrick was _such_ a tease, and David moaned, opening his legs wider to give Patrick better access, because it wasn’t as if Patrick _wasn’t_ touching David’s junk; he had a whole hand full of it, and his mouth was sucking _hard_ on that soft, tender skin. “Patrick,” David heard himself whine, because Patrick was close, so close, yet not nearly close enough, goddamn. David was so hard he was in physical pain.

“I respect this so much,” Patrick said, when he finally came off it. There was going to be another hickey there on David’s inner thigh, and just the thought of it was making David leak; Patrick just had to give him a few rough strokes. David would be done, and Patrick wouldn’t have to be embarrassed at all about how quickly he had come. Then Patrick bit the spot he had sucked, and David’s hips came off the bed, his startled yelp so loud in the quiet room that David swore he could hear an echo.

“So much respect,” was all Patrick murmured, his hand still around David’s cock, his mouth moving down to David’s knee.

“My knee doesn’t need respect,” David protested.

“Why not?” Patrick asked, swirling his tongue around the patella, cutting through the path with a scrape of his teeth.

“Because it’s my knee.” David jerked away; it kind of tickled.

“Not a sex thing?” Patrick was all the way down there and David couldn’t see him anymore, not unless he propped himself on his elbows, and his hands were still on the bars, so he couldn’t—but David could _hear_ him smiling.

“When were _knees_ ever a sex thing?”

“So being on your knees, not hot, I gotcha.” Patrick let go of David’s cock.

“Oh my God,” David groaned, throwing back his head, because Patrick was a pain, and also moving down David’s calf—kissing, stroking, doing that nuzzling thing with his nose.

“Personally, I like your knees. I think they’re hot. How about ankles?” Patrick asked. “Can I respect your ankles?”

“Don’t,” David said, because with all this, he felt like he didn’t even _know_ if his ankles were sensitive.

“Okay.” Patrick had lifted David’s ankle, but now he set it back down. “Can you turn over?”

“What?”

“You can let go of the bars.”

“But what about . . . ?” David took his hands off the bars and glanced down at his cock—wet, now, from the lube and attention. David brought himself up on elbows so he could look down at Patrick. “Are you trying to drive me insane?”

“No.” Patrick rubbed his dry hand up and down David’s shin, lips quirked up on the side. “I want to respect your backside.”

“Oh.” Heat flushed through David’s face in an embarrassed, pleasurable wave, twisting his mouth, taking his breath, his voice. 

“I’ve told you I like other parts,” said Patrick, climbing over David to straddle him again, acting as though he didn’t even notice the way that David’s cock brushed his jeans. “Your arms,” Patrick said, kissing David’s mouth. “Your hands,” another kiss, “your thighs.” Patrick’s lips moved down along David’s jaw. “You chest is hot,” Patrick said, moving a flat palm firmly down David’s sternum. “This,” he said, palm landing over David’s abdomen, “your stomach, turns me on.”

David looked away; this was like being tortured. 

“I like your legs. David. You make me really . . . I like your ankles, even if you don’t want me to touch them.”

“It’s not like I’d stop you,” said David.

There was a pause. “I just feel I haven’t been clear about how good-looking you are from behind.”

Heat pulsed uncomfortably in David’s temple now; it was too _nice_. David squirmed without intending to, and David’s wet cock brush Patrick’s jeans again, not enough.

“I don’t think I’ve gotten to see enough to properly admire it,” Patrick went on. “I only got you naked once, and I was—distracted. I intend to get you naked a whole lot more—”

David squirmed again.

“—but I wanna look at what I’m getting,” Patrick said. “I wanna look a lot. Is that a problem for you?”

Biting his lips, David shook his head. “No,” he said, just to clarify. “It’s not. It’s not a problem.”

“All right. Because sometimes it seems like you don’t like it when I look.”

“I like it,” David said quickly, looking back at Patrick in startlement, because the idea that David didn’t like that was ludicrous. Where had Patrick even gotten that idea? “I like it a lot; you can . . . l-look—” David stumbled over the word, and okay, maybe that was where Patrick had gotten that idea—“you can look all you want. You can—um. If you want me to turn over, can I have a towel? Because—your duvet.”

The smile that tugged the corners of Patrick’s mouth looked surprised and so, so amused, as though it was endlessly charming that David thought about these things, when really David was just being practical. “Yeah,” Patrick said, slowly getting off of him. “Yeah, I’ll get you a towel.”

Then he was squeezing David’s foot, standing, leaving the room—for the bathroom, apparently, gone for long enough that David had to think about it, what Patrick had said he wanted to do to him, and David didn’t really understand. Just look at him? Why? Almost half an hour had passed with Patrick just touching David’s arms, kissing his hips, leaving hickeys on his thighs. What kind of person did those things?

Then Patrick was back, laying the towel out on the bed so that when David lay stomach-down, his lubed cock didn’t mess up Patrick’s comforter. Once David was situated, he twisted to look at Patrick, who was standing beside the bed. “Was this what you wanted?” David asked, because he was feeling very vulnerable laid out like this.

“Yeah.” Patrick got on the bed, lying on his side beside David. “It’s what I want,” Patrick said, hand on David’s shoulder, stroking down David’s back, then again, then again. In the quiet of the room, David could hear Patrick’s breathing growing a little faster, a little noisier, as though this, just this, was doing it for him—lying beside David, stroking him over and over. 

The stroking was very soothing, and the expression of something like wonder on Patrick’s face was a little too much. David turned his head to the other side, and Patrick moved closer, leaning over David now, his lips at David’s ear. “I remember when you fingered yourself for me,” he whispered.

“Are you—do you want me to again?”

“No.” Patrick’s hand moved down from David’s back to David’s ass, stroking over it long and sure, and then again. And again. “I think about it, though,” Patrick said presently. “I think about it all the time. How you looked. The fact that you did it is so—but you couldn’t see how it looked, with your fingers, inside yourself, stroking yourself . . .”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to?” David asked, hand lifting behind himself to touch Patrick’s on is ass. “I could—”

“David.” Then Patrick was taking David’s hand, pinning it to the bed, climbing on top of David, straddling him again—this time sitting on David’s ass with his scratchy jeans, and Patrick leaned down to David’s ear again, one hand still on David’s hand, but the other on David’s neck. “I never got to touch another man this way,” Patrick said breathlessly. “I looked. Sometimes I wanted—but I never—I never touched like this, feeling like this. I want every inch of you. Do you hear me? Every inch.”

“Uh-huh,” David said quickly, because Patrick might stop, and he was already kissing David’s nape, letting his teeth drag over it, and David was bucking under him, into the towel; he was so turned on. He was still really turned on. _You can have me_ , he thought. _Take it_.

The sound of Patrick’s breathing filled the room, heavily and aching—turned on too, though David couldn’t really tell whether Patrick was hard with the way he was straddling David in jeans. The messy sounds of kisses occasionally filled in gaps of breath as Patrick kissed his way down David’s spine, tongue occasionally swirling around the knobs of it, teeth occasionally taking the place of tongue. “You know you’re beautiful,” Patrick said harshly, once he’d moved down, off of David’s ass, straddling David’s legs now so that his mouth could kiss David’s lower back. “You don’t need me to tell you. You know it.”

“But I like people who agree with me,” David whispered.

Patrick’s laughter was hot against David’s back. “I agree with you. I definitely agree. This back is—one of the better things I’ve ever seen.” Patrick traced the wing-shape of David’s shoulder blade with a fingertip, then moved back up to trace it with tongue. 

David shuddered under him.

“Did I find a sex thing?” Patrick murmured, but didn’t wait for an answer, his nails scratching one shoulder blade while his teeth found the other, biting rather hard at the skin stretched over bone.

David cried out, bucking up again. 

Patrick moved back up so he was straddling David’s ass, and then his lips were by David’s ear. “Remember when you were on the phone with me?” Patrick asked, and then—weight bore down on David’s ass, and he felt the brush of Patrick’s jeans; Patrick had thrust against David’s ass fully clothed, and David’s cock jumped under him, against the towel. “You told me to turn over,” Patrick said, and then he did it again, rolling his hips against David’s ass. “You told me to fuck the mattress.”

Oh God. David’s hips jerked again.

“Yeah,” Patrick whispered. “Like that.” His hips bore down again, thrusting against David, the crotch of his jeans scratchy against David’s ass. “This was where I did it,” Patrick said. “In this bed.”

David heard himself make a sound, hips jerking again so his cock could thrust uncomfortably against the roughness of the towel. He couldn’t _help_ it; Patrick was so hot, and David wanted it so bad, and Patrick was mirroring his movement, thrusting again, as though he was fucking him, as though he was fucking him with his jeans on.

“I want you to fuck,” Patrick whispered. “I wanna see the way you fuck.”

It was kind of embarrassing, fucking the mattress. David realized that now; he hadn’t on the phone, except now he wanted it too much to care. He didn’t care; it was too hot; Patrick was too hot, and David needed to fuck—the way Patrick was on top of him, humping into him—it was too much. God, it was too much, and David was thrusting into the mattress, his cock uncomfortably pinned and the terrycloth too rough, and Patrick was on top of him, thrusting into him, the crotch of his jeans abrading David’s ass, burning, now, with friction.

“Yeah,” Patrick was saying. “I wanna see; I wanna see you fuck—” His hand buried in David’s hair, pushing him down now as he thrust, just as though Patrick was really fucking him, driving him into the mattress, and David moaned. He didn’t even know if he could come like this, his cock not quite getting what it needed, trapped between the towel and his own skin, but he didn’t care. He didn’t care; he felt so—so— _used_ , but in the good way, in the best of ways, where Patrick was doing it to make him feel good, where he was naked while Patrick was fully clothed and making him fuck the mattress—

“Jesus, David.” Then Patrick was getting off of him, pulling him by the side.

“What?” David asked, because he wasn’t sure what Patrick wanted.

“On your back,” said Patrick, and then he was there with the lube, doing something with it, and then his hand was on David’s cock, the lube still cool, but it felt kind of good after thrusting against the towel. “Shh,” Patrick said, and David realized the high, startled sound he’d just heard had been him, and Patrick was working David’s cock fast, which was good, because David was so, so close. “Shh,” Patrick said again, and David realized he was whining; he needed to be coherent. He needed to be coherent.

“Can you,” David began, but couldn’t finish.

“Yeah, anything,” Patrick said, still stroking David’s cock—still kind of inexpertly, but A for effort; he was trying so hard—“anything, I want you to come now. I’m gonna make you come.”

“My ass,” David said.

“What do you want?” Patrick said, taking his hand off David’s cock, which was the wrong thing to do. “Do you want me to—?” He started reaching around David.

“No,” said David. “I just meant—can we just . . . ?” But it was too difficult to explain, so David did it for him, tugging Patrick up on the bed, David turning on his side, reaching for Patrick’s arm to pull over him so Patrick’s hand could be on David’s dick again, but now Patrick was spooned behind him, and David could feel Patrick’s jeans on his ass again. “Fuck me like this,” David told him, even though Patrick was already starting to, his hand moving on David’s cock. “Fuck me,” David told him, pressing his ass against Patrick’s jeans.

“Yeah, baby. I’ll fuck you. I’ll fuck you any way you want me to.” Then Patrick got his leg over, over both of David’s, and he humped into David hard, and David thrust into Patrick’s hand, and Patrick said, “I’ve fucked this bed so many times, pretending it’s you.” David cried out, then came, and Patrick bit his shoulder, not hard enough, holding on with teeth as David thrust and thrust.

Far too late, David realized they hadn’t moved the towel. Some of it was in Patrick’s hand, but the duvet had suffered as well.

“That was so good,” Patrick said, leaning over to pepper David’s face with kisses. “So good, you looked so good.”

Okay, but Patrick had promised. David reached down, bringing up Patrick’s hand, a good streak of come on it.

Patrick’s breath caught, but David licked Patrick’s hand anyway, getting it in his mouth, tasting himself and Patrick’s fingers. Then David twisted, turning to Patrick.

“David,” Patrick breathed, but then he was kissing him—which was permission, David guessed, because David wasn’t even the hugest fan of snowballing, but it should be done right, and it hadn’t been done right the last time. This was something that annoyed other people, a lot; they didn’t understand that there was a correct way to do things, and David pushed the come into Patrick’s mouth.

Patrick pulled away, his leg coming off of David. Then Patrick grabbed David’s face, pulling it to him to kiss him again, passing it back. This was when the come started to get gross, mixed with Patrick’s saliva and David’s own. Pulling away, David turned to face Patrick on the bed, then leaned in to kiss Patrick, who was swallowing. “Oh, again?” said Patrick, who seemed to think this was _funny_ , for some reason, but he let David do it, kissing him again, taking back the come and spit. 

There was more, now, harder for Patrick to hold in his mouth, and David wanted to do it again, and again, until Patrick was choking on it, until it was so disgusting that neither of them could stand it, but when Patrick passed it back, David swallowed, taking it all down. Patrick’s hand immediately went to David’s neck, stroking as though it had somehow been difficult to take, but Patrick was kissing him, and kissing him, apparently not finding it too gross to keep kissing.

“Thank you,” Patrick murmured. 

_For snowballing_? David wanted to say, because not that many people were fans, but now Patrick was kissing his throat, saying thank you over and over.

“Thank you for letting me,” Patrick said. “Thank you.”

“What for?” David finally said, because he couldn’t take it anymore.

“I don’t know,” Patrick said, kissing him again. “For letting me touch you, for being you.”

“Who else would I be?”

“No one.” Patrick moved closer, lining up his whole body against David’s, tucking his head under David’s chin, nuzzling into his neck. “No one can keep an appointment on a calendar like you.”

“I’m not very punctual,” David said, putting an arm around Patrick. “But I do arrive with style.”

“If that’s what you want to call it.” Patrick kissed David’s neck.

“That’s definitely what I want to call it,” David said, affronted. “What would you call it?”

Patrick kissed his neck again.

David moved his hand to the waistband of Patrick’s jeans, tucking a finger between the denim and Patrick’s hip. “Do you want?” David said, tugging the denim and letting his words hang there, like his finger.

“Later. I want . . . I’ve hardly gotten to do this. With you.”

“Do what?”

Patrick’s face pushed against David’s neck, his hand settling on David’s hip—where he’d left that hickey, stroking down along the side of David’s ass, his thigh, then back up to his hip again.

 _Oh._ “I didn’t know you were a cuddler,” David said.

“I didn’t know I was.”

“How could you not know that?”

“I didn’t know a lot of things, David.”

Patrick was smiling against David’s neck, but David still felt a little bad about it. Patrick’s ear was right there, though, little and oddly shaped, so David pulled apart enough to kiss it. He was excellent at cuddling, a real pro; he liked it a lot—when he wanted to do it, which wasn’t all the time, because sometimes he didn’t want anybody’s hands on him at all, but Patrick was right. This was nice. David pulled away. “Do I really have to be the only one naked here? Because it seems unfair.”

Patrick laughed at him, but he got up, taking off his clothes, turning on the lamp but going to turn off the overhead light.

“Oh, turn the light off when _you_ get undressed; I see how it is.”

“Come on,” Patrick said, coming back to the bed, and he was really, really hot, but he had absolutely no waist or hips. It was a wonder how he got that ass, but David couldn’t see it, because Patrick was by the bed now and pushing on David’s shoulder. “Get off.”

“Why?”

“I want under the covers.”

“And you get covers?” David said, but he was getting off the bed. “Don’t _I_ get to look at _you_?”

“You can,” Patrick said, getting into the bed. “I just imagined you in this bed with me enough times; I thought you’d want to give me my fantasy.”

“That’s not fair,” David complained, but he got back into the bed, under the covers.

“Do we have to be fair, now?” Patrick said, pulling David to him. “Is that something we have to do?”

“I prefer to be treated as an equal.”

“Oh, an _equal_.” Patrick laughed, reaching down for David’s ass, tugging so he could get David’s legs over his own. He also got David’s head on his chest, David half sprawled over him, David’s arm around his waist. “I’ll see what I can do,” Patrick whispered down into David’s hair. 

One hand stayed at David’s waist, the other reaching around to bury itself in David’s hair, stroking through that thick coarse jungle as though it was something pleasant, and this was nice. This was so, so nice, Patrick wanting to hold him like this, like it was all Patrick wanted to do.

David could hear Patrick’s heartbeat, a steady thump, thump, thump. Bringing his hand up, David touched Patrick’s chest, his side, fitting his fingers in between each rib, settling his hand there as though he could be the cage for Patrick’s heart. _It’s mine_ , David thought. _No one else can hear your heart right now; it’s only me; it’s mine._ Tilting his head, David kissed Patrick’s neck, just to stop himself from saying words.

“Thank you,” Patrick said.

*

David opened his eyes to soft yellow light, warm skin, and a pool of wet.

Patrick.

Ray’s.

“Ew,” David said in horror, wiping the drool off Patrick’s chest, but now his hand was wet. “Ew,” he told the drool, looking at it in consternation.

“It’s okay,” said Patrick.

“No, it’s not! Oh my God.”

Laughing, Patrick made the towel from before magically appear—the towel that had lube and pre-come on it somewhere, _thanks Patrick_ , but it was better than nothing. Wiping his hand off on it quickly, David dabbed at Patrick’s chest—how mortifying—then dropped the towel over the side of the bed. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

“It’s okay,” Patrick said again.

“But I want—how long before Ray comes back?”

Patrick checked his phone. “Any minute.”

“But I wanted to do you.”

The sides of Patrick’s eyes crinkled into that fond smile. 

“What?” David demanded.

“You did me, David.”

Huffing, David said, “I wanted to do you again.”

The smile was trying to work its way out and show Patrick’s teeth, but Patrick resisted the grin. “All right, you can—just not tonight. I think a better plan would be to get dressed and pick a game we can tell Ray we played all evening.”

David froze. “Game? You mean like . . . checkers. Or Monopoly?”

That smile just kept coming back. “I meant like Risk or backgammon,” said Patrick, “since those are literally the two games I have.”

“Don’t tease me,” David breathed.

“About board games?”

“About _Risk_.”

Patrick laughed. “Why, because it’s nerdy? It’s not that bad, if you give it a chance.”

Hurriedly, David got out of bed, got over to the credenza, started getting on his clothes, while Patrick laughed some more. “Wow, okay, so games are a turn off. I’ll keep that in mind for the future.”

Whirling around, David found Patrick’s jeans, tossing them at him, then his shirts, his underwear. “Put them on. Come on. Come on,” David said again, going over to the bed, because Patrick wasn’t doing it fast enough, and David tried to help him put his undershirt on over his head, but kissed him instead. “Hurry up. Hurry up!” Then he went to go put his sweatshirt on.

“David?”

“Alexis and Mom think games like that are stupid. Dad likes them, but he’s too _nice_ ; I haven’t played Risk since I was _literally_ fifteen; I was trying to be cool; what are you doing? Come on.”

Patrick was laughing, laughing and laughing, but he put on his underwear and jeans, and David went over to help with his buttons. Eventually Patrick was laughing at him too hard and stopped trying to help him, kissing him instead. “David,” he said, walking David into the door, kissing him against it.

David pulled away. “I get to be red.”

Patrick laughed again, shaking his head. “You do know that Ray will probably want to play?”

“Great, more people for me to destroy. Are you dressed now? Can I have another tequila sunrise?”

“Yes,” Patrick said, kissing him. “You can have anything you want.”

“Australia,” David said, pulling away again. “If you get that, you get armies every time; then you move to take Asia, and then the game is over.”

“Well, now that I know your strategy,” Patrick teased.

“I’ll still win,” said David.

*

Patrick decimated both Ray and David at Risk—using South _America_ , dammit. Sergio, their sometimes bodyguard, used to play it with him; Sergio always used Australia. Patrick and Sergio would probably really get along. What was Sergio doing these days? Now that he was not pulling David half-naked out of clubs?

Patrick drove David home, leaning over to kiss him before David got out. “I’m glad we made this a recurring appointment,” Patrick said, pulling away. “Because, you know, otherwise I’d’ve just started booking things over it and forgotten all about you.”

“Give me your phone,” David said.

Patrick huffed a laugh, trying to kiss him again.

“Give it.” David reached for Patrick’s pocket.

“Why?”

“Put it on the calendar thingy,” David said. “I want to look at it.”

“David.” Patrick’s voice was remonstrative, but he was already pulling out his phone. “I’m not going to schedule over you.”

“I know. Give it to me.” Patrick pulled up the calendar app and handed the phone to David, who flipped to Sunday because he didn’t actually need to look at it. Scrolling down, he found six o’clock. If he put it for six-fifteen, that should be time enough to close the store. David was almost done creating the appointment when he looked up. “Can I put something in here?”

“Looks like you’re already putting something in there,” said Patrick, mocking him.

“Right, but I didn’t mean—” Biting his lips, David cut himself off. “I respect you too, you know.”

“That’s all right,” Patrick said, highly amused. “You won't see all my appointments to visit the Dude Cave if you go looking through there. I deleted them all the day I met you.”

“The Dude Cave isn’t as bad as it sounds,” David said, finishing up with the appointment. “Leo’s pretty hot.”

“Oh, I know,” said Patrick.

“Umm.” Clutching the phone, David stared at him.

Patrick laughed. “Stevie told me.”

“Stevie!” Ugh. Losing interest, since Patrick had obviously never been to the Dude Cave, David handed the phone back out to Patrick, who took it and immediately scrolled to find what David had done.

“‘Date double-you David,’” Patrick read. “We’re going on a date?” 

“No, it’s our yodeling lesson.”

“Did you have something planned? Or did you just want to fill in that blank box?”

David head could not hold this ridiculous question. “Do you even know me at all? Do you think I’d schedule a date with you without a plan?”

“I don’t know. I thought we were letting things flow.” Patrick finally looked up from his phone, and the incandescence of his smile made David’s heart feel like it was going to punch a hole right through his chest.

“Um,” David said weakly. “We are?”

Patrick leaned in to kiss him, still so happy, and David could feel Patrick’s smile all over his face, in every kiss—to his temple, to his cheek, to his _nose_ , for crying out loud. David pulled away. “I’m not,” David said, pulling away, but he wasn’t sure what he wasn’t. “It’s just a date.”

“Yeah,” Patrick said, happily settling back into the driver’s seat. “I just really like having it on the calendar; that’s all.”

Back when David was buying designer planners—before the bujo phase—he used to hate the fact that all the best ones were for twelve to eighteen months. Even a year seemed like longer than he could reliably last, as if he was somehow running on fumes, the future breathing down his neck like a thing to be feared. Now when David thought of those planners, he thought of the lovely Smythson one with the scarlet crocodile print calf leather, the Hobonichi Techo notebooks with its unobtrusive charts, the bullet journal he’d made the year before the move with its pristine gold calendar. He thought of making an appointment one whole year later. It would say _Be w David_. 

It would be an appointment Patrick kept.


End file.
